reset contacts

I recently visited an Apple store because I have duplicate, sometimes triplicate contacts appearing on my ipad. they suggested i go to my icloud account on my PC, turn off contacts on my ipad, update, and/or delete my contacts in the cloud, then turn on contacts on my iPad to update from the cloud. I did all that, and when I turned contacts back on on the iPad, it said all contacts will be merged with iCloud. now I have all the duplicates again in the cloud and on my ipad. What am i doing wrong? I want the cloud to be the parent, not my ipad or iphone. please help

Thank you..