Some of the Italian tenses won't match up with English tenses, and even those that basically match tend to treat the tense a little differently to English thinking (imperfetto is a really good example of this). Radio Arlecchino is a good podcast which explains and demonstrates the Italian tenses (and other bits of grammar), and they managed to cover quite a lot in just 22 podcasts. http://coerll.utexas.edu/ra/

There are a lot of tenses but if you take on one at a time it becomes much more manageable. Try move on to a new tense until you're comfortable with each new one, otherwise you risk mixing them all up. Focus on the present first, then the passato prossimo will be the next most useful (ho trovato / I have found). You can get a lot of mileage out of learning the tenses for the most common verbs first (essere, avere, andare, fare). Keep in mind these most common verbs almost all have irregular conjugations, but you'll need to be familiar with at least the basics of each. Buon coraggio!

In Italian, we have to ways to express the verb to be: verbo essere e verbo stare. I am going to write the present tense of the verb to be in English and then in Italian. I am, you are, he/she/it is, we are, you are, they are (presente simple of the verb to be) Io sono, tu sei, lui/lei è, noi siamo voi siete, loro sono (presente indicativo del verbo essere) Io sto, tu stai, lui/lei sta, noi stiamo, voi state, loro stanno (presente indicativo del verbo stare) For what concern the past, in English you have the past simple, the presente perfect. and the present perfect continuous) I will write the past of the verb to be, but the same works for other verbs. I was, you were, he/she/it was, we were, you were, they were (past simple) I have been, you have been, he/she/it has been, we have been, you have been, they have been (present perfect). In Italian, we can traslate these two tenses into three different tenses: indicativo imperfetto del verbo essere, passato prossimo del verbo essere, passato remoto del verbo essere Io ero, tu eri, lui/lei era, noi eravamo, voi eravate, loro erano (imperfetto) Io sono stato, tu sei stato, lui/lei è stato, noi siamo stati, voi siete stato, loro sono stati (passato prossimo) Io fui, tu fosti, lui/lei fu, noi fummo, voi foste, loro furono (passato remoto) I have not mentioned the usage of the three and I have not mentioned the subjunctive and other tenses, but to give you an overview, you need to know that the verb to be in English has two forms in Italian, and that the past in English (past simple, present perfect and present perfect continuous that I have no mentioned) has three main tenses in Italian (passato prossimo, imperfetto and passato remoto). I hope this answer can be of some help! Good luck on your Italian. Elia.