Yeah, learning hiragana and katakana is essential. You'll want to get away from roman characters as quickly as possible. After that you could study some basic grammar to understand how Japanese is different from English, practice writing/reading kana, maybe start watching Japanese movies/anime with subtitles to understand the Japanese sounds, and chat/talk with native speakers. I recommend you start learning kanji pretty early on too. Some useful sites are: http://www.guidetojapanese.org/ , a really good site for grammar http://anki.ichi2.net/ , Anki, a flashcard program that's excellent for learning just about anything (vocabulary, sentence patterns, kana/kanji) http://lang-8.com/ , a journal site where native speakers can correct your posts and help you understand the language. A great way to practice using real Japanese. Good luck, and have fun studying Japanese. :P

You could also learn Japanese at this site http://iknow.co.jp. There are many courses for you to learn. I'm studying English and Japanese at this site every day.

Yea! Hiragana is priority :)

yeah, you must learn hiragana first! without it, you can not know the japanese pronounciation. I am also learning Japanese, so I think it's better for you to pay much attention on pronounciation because it is hardly corrected if you have leant Japanese for several years. why don't u use common files at italki. i have uploaded some files for english learners. hope it will help u! And if you have some questions, try to ask it at italki/answer, i think many italki users will help you!