I had trouble sharpening for a while, my results were so-so and it was frustrating. The problem I had was I just didn't have a basic comprehension of what I was doing and at the same time being exposed to an overwhelming amount of information on the the subject. Once I understood the basics it was easy and the results were good. Bench stones (IMO) offer the most versatility for the least cost (with some exceptions), so if you have a very coarse and very fine stone you already have all you need. If your looking for a nice symmetrical edge that's pretty then know accomplishing this free hand without any sort of guide is difficult even with practice but if your goal is a sharp knife with edge appearance being of little concern, it's easy.
With the coarse stone grind down on one side of the knife until you raise a burr along the entire edge, then flip it over and do the same to the other side. Don't be too concerned about the angle, keep it low with the spine of the knife just slightly off the stone, the goal is to thin out the metal behind the edge and remove enough metal from each side as to get to the point where the two sides meet (that's why you grind until you get a complete burr before going to the other side). How you do this step doesn't matter, back and forth/circular motions/scrubbing, removing metal is all your doing.
When done with the above work on the coarse stone move to the fine stone.
With the fine stone you are setting the cutting edge, place the knife on the stone (burr down) at an angle slightly higher then the low angle you used with the coarse stone, and draw the knife across in one direction (heel to tip/into the stone), alternate sides after each pass. The actual edge your producing will be small, your not looking to hone the entire edge you made with the coarse stone (unless you have a lot of time you want to kill), that's why you raise the angle. Go very slow as to maintain the same angle as best as possible, you can put some pressure on the knife while sweeping it against the stone but lighten up a bit with each stroke and just the weight of the knife for the last few strokes, after 15-20 passes on each side check your results.
If you have an old knife try it out, it's an easy way to get results. Just know that if the coarse stone isn't coarse enough metal removal takes longer and if the fine isn't very fine your edge will only be so good.