Clueless as what to do in middle game

In this game by move 12 I had no idea what to do as to how to develop my queen and rooks or how to attack the opponent. Does anyone have any recommendations? 

Here is the game 

The way you played the opening led to an awkward position in the early middle game, around move 12 like you mention.

4.d4 is more to the point than d3. Be direct. 

6.Nd2 is better than Nc3. Black could have gone Bg4 and that pin is annoying. Some general plans in the Italian:

The idea is often in some order the moves c3 Nd2 h3 Re1 Nf1 Ng3. You are bringing your knights over to the kingside and hopefully can land one on the nice square f5. 

Don't allow your light squared bishop to be exchanged for a black knight. 

Hold the centre together and look to play d4 (from d3) when it is safe to do it. Here as I say you could have played it on move 4 because 3.h6 by black is not so good.

7.Na4 was an option exchanging your knight for the Bc5 and then playing Be3 (after h3 so you don't allow Ng4).

10.Ne2 intending Ng3 and playing c3 was a better plan than Nd5.

And we get to move 12 and the position is pretty lifeless. You had to play Bxe6 I think and obviously you ended up hanging that bishop.

 Watch some videos on the Italian game and the Giuoco piannisimo. The opening is full of subtleties which can lead to much more interesting middle game positions than what you got on move 12.

@strangemover +1. Your opportunities to avoid this were earlier than move 12. Look up Giuoco Piannisimo which leads to a much more interesting middlegame by playing d4 directly or preparing d4 with c3. Your opponents h6 was weakening. They fall behind in development by making an unnecessary pawn move and weaken their kingside. When you see the h-pawn pushed like this early in the opening you could think about opening up the position with d4 to exchange off pawns and develop rapidly, looking for tactics and trying to catch their king in the centre, or continue to keep the game more closed and wait to see if they castle kingside, leaving yours in the centre or going queenside, then pawnstorm on the kingside to loosen up their position with pieces to follow. h6 is a good target for g4-g5.

You played only 150 games... Watch some Agadmator and Gotham Chess on yt and play.

+1

After d4 at move 4 what's the idea? Black plays exd4 which white can't cover with the knight because of black's knight. So white just loses a pawn.

No pawn is lost because the white queen also covers d4. So exd4 Nxd4 and black must choose what to do. Nxd4 Qxd4 is not good for black because the queen is unopposed in the centre. So Bc5 maybe, but Be3 or Nb3 are all good for white. Basically with d4 white forces black to make concessions in the centre and takes control of it. 3.h6 is a poor move for black fighting ghosts because all it achieves is preventing some future Ng5 and this is not a real threat by white. 

Succinct overviews of the Italian Game - the primary variations, and their themes and plans...

https://www.chessstrategyonline.com/content/tutorials/introduction-to-the-chess-openings-italian-game

https://simplifychess.com/italian-game/

Note:  Italian Game is comprised of the following three openings...

Giuoco Pianissimo - 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d3

Giuoco Piano -  1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d4

Two Knights Defence - 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6

Thanks for the in depth explanation. I’ll make sure to move my d pawn to the 4 rank if possible, attacking kingside with knights, and everything else you said. This will help me a lot!

Thanks also for the recommended moves! I’ll definitely look into the Giucco Pianissmo.

Apologies. I meant Giuocco Piano. Pianissimo is the line you played, Piano is it's more exciting brother. Blame my predictive text.

If you finished development and you cant find a good attack you should find your worst placed piece and find a better square for it