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Kana has two kinds, Hiragana ( kana is changed to gana here) and Katakana. Hiragawa is for general use and Katakana is used to express foreign word or imported words from western world. Two types of charactes were invented from Kanji to express Japanese sounds in Japan. Kanjis were imported from Chine about 1500 years ago, when China was named Kan and ji means character in Japanese. Until then, Japan has no characters. But each Kanji has too many parts and inconvinient to express Japanese sounds then Hiraganas and Katakanas was created from Kanjis. Japanese has about 50 sounds, each has combined of one konsonent and one vowel, and the konsonent has only 9 and the vowel only 5, they made to 50 Kana sounds including no konsonent type.

For Hiragana, the relation is as follows.
Each Kanji was deformed to Hiragana by simplicating the Kanji.
Can you imagine the deformation process.

For example, 安（AN)　to あ　by modefing the part of the lines of 安　to smoothing, others are the same process.


Consonant A I U E O
No あ い う え お
Pronaunc. A I U E O
Base Kanji 安 以 宇 衣 於
K か き く け こ
Pronaunc. KA KI] KU KE KO
Base Kanji 加 幾 久 計 己
S さ し す せ そ
Pronaunc. SA SI SU SE SO
Base Kanji 左 之 寸 世 曽
T た ち つ て と
Pronaunc. TA TI TU TE TO
Base Kanji 太 知 川 天 止
N な に ぬ ね の
Pronaunc. NA NI NU NE NO
Base Kanji 奈 仁 奴 祢 乃
H は ひ ふ へ ほ
Pronaunc. HA HI HU HE HO
Base Kanji 波 比 不 部 保
M ま み む め も
Pronaunc. MA MI MU ME MO
Base Kanji 末 美 武 女 毛
Y や - ゆ - よ
Pronaunc. YA - YU - YO
Base Kanji 也 - 由 - 与
R ら り る れ ろ
Pronaunc. RA RI RU RE RO
Base Kanji 良 利 留 礼 呂
W わ ゐ - ゑ を
Pronaunc. WA I - E WO
Base Kanji 和 為 - 恵 遠
Onlyy ん
Pronaunc. N
Base Kanji 无

Typical Japanese sentences have the following structure.
Subject made by Kanjis + Particle made by Kanas + Verb made by Kanjis and Kanas
as
石が転がる。（ISHI GA KORO　GARU)
S P V
A Rock rolls.
or Rocks roll.
Japanese does not clarify the subject is single or plural in many cases, which tends to lead troubles, if it is crucial.
Particles separate each component of sentences

Thus the Kanji occupies the center of Japanese sentences.
We have to learn Kanji for the first.

Kanji is a character which has two faces, one is meaning and the other is pronouciation(s).
Japanese introduced Kanji a thousand years ago from China, thus Kanji in Japan has two types of pronouciation. one is Kun-yomi(Japanese type pronouciation), the other On-yomi(Chinese type pronouciation)
For example
石:meaning rock or rocks
:Kun-yomi　ISHI
　:on-yomi SEKI
転:meaning roll
:Kun-yomi KORO(garu)
:On-yomi TEN
When we use Kanji for verbs, it usually categorize to two types. One is
Japanese type use. another is Chinese type use.
In Japanese type use, the verb is one Kanji + kanas such as 転がる。
In　Chinese type　use, the verb is two or more Kanjis + する　such as 回転する。（KAITEN　SURU).
where 回転 also means roll, but it implies more formal and Chinese type usage some times appears in formal articles or sentences.

The above example is for present tense. For past tense, it changes to the followings.

石が転がった。（　ISHI GA　KORO　GATTA)
石が回転した。（　ISHI GA　KAITEN SHITA)

Japanese　does not have perfect tense, it sometimes leads troubles in communications.

As for subjects, we have two types of words, one is Japanese traditional nouns, the other China origin ones.

Thus, you can choose four kinds of different levels of formality in Japanese sentences. But, in practice, it is enough to learn the most casual one, where the subject and verbe are Japanese type, in which the pronouciation is Kun-yomi, and the most formal one is China origin with On-yomi.

Thus, the most priority how to use Kanji is to identify if you are in formal or not.

If you are in chatting, you use the casual Japanese type, and if you are writing articles or papers, you use the China origin ones.