I like the idea of branching away from 12-tone theory, it's just that I have no idea how to make it WORK.

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I can create microtonal music and digital audio workstations, both commercial and free, or even something like audacity. The problem is, without something like functional harmony, etc. to ground me, I have no idea how to set up phrases or resolve them. I have no idea what sort of progressions might work or sound nice. So I always fall back on 12 tone conventions even when I innovate in a microtonal context.

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For example you can take a common tonal phrase, like a ii-V-I and then repeat it, but each time transpose the whole phrase by some microtonal amount. This will allow you to modulate to a new key, except much more imperceptibly. But I'm still falling back on a tonal convention. And tonal conventions make sense because the consonant intervals (especially in just intonation) of Western tonal music are based on, or at the very least approximate, pitch ratios that appear in the harmonic series, which arises in nature. Sounds have fundamental frequencies, and then they have overtones, which correspond to intervals like the octave, and the just perfect fifth.