ah, so you want to learn romanian. That's nice, our language is beautiful. But the grammar is not that easy.
About contractions: the sign - shows that you should pronounce in the same sylabus both words. So if you have ,,ce-ai'' you will pronounce ceai, and not ce ai, like 2 sylabus.
It is harder with the pronounciation, coz I have no ideea how could I translate this things in order to be understandable for you. It's good that you want to learn romanian, but it will be easier when you will arrive there to understand it. Good voyage to you