I know you can join to different meshes together with ctr+j is there any way to seperate a part of a mesh and edit it seperatly. In most programs you can cut objects and paste in other places…this isnt available in blender…please help me. Maybe parents and children are involved 
No problemo. Just select the vertices you want to be seperated in edit mode, and hit ‘P’. If you want to unparent an object, use Alt P.
Goofster has added a feature thats splits up a mush based on weather they are joined.