And place your verbs at the end. I always thought of it as parenthesis, where the primary subject was the first word, primary verb the last. Secondary is the second and second to last. Toss the objects and modifiers in the center.

Oh! But don't forget tense and honorifics appended to the verbs and nouns.

In other words, you'll get the hang of the grammar pretty quick, especially if you have a solid knowledge of sentence diagramming (who'd a thunk it was useful?)

But understanding conversation?!? That takes years of daily speaking in order to train your mind to 'think in brackets in real time'

I think you could get a fundamental base in order to comfortably travel and fumble around by studying at home, but if you aren't in the country daily speaking? Best of luck.

It is fun though when that awkward structure clicks and you can speak!