Purchase drum instruction materials. Playing electronic drums requires the same drumming technique as acoustic drums. The first step, therefore, is to develop proper drum technique. Find instructional books, DVDs and online lessons, and consider private lessons with a drum instructor.
Set up the electronic drum set. Read the instruction manual for your set. Different sets have different features. Some have many whistles and bells that make it possible to make lots of different instrument sounds besides drum sounds. Adjust the drum sound to your liking.
Practice basic drum techniques. Plug in the headphones or small speakers and adjust the tone and volume level. Each individual part of the set--including the bass drum, cymbals and snare drums--needs to be adjusted, and the overall volume levels needs to be set. Practice with a metronome (which some kits have built in) and do different rhythm exercises.
Play along with a variety of sampled songs. One cool feature of many electronic sets is that they have a number of sampled songs in their memories such as salsa, jazz, rock and funk tunes. Developing the ability to play different musical genres will help develop your chops and technique. It is also possible to control the tempo for the various sampled pieces of music. When you are learning a piece of music, or working on specific techniques, always start at a slow temp and gradually increase the tempo.
Steal licks from your favorite drummers. It is also possible to plug your CD player into the electronic drum set and play along with your favorite bands and drummers. Adjust the volume level to blend the drums with the recording. Musicians develop their skills by imitating and stealing licks from their heroes. The goal is to blend the different influences together and develop your own voice and style.