You were trying to go by the example in the doc, but you went a little too far afield. I fixed it up for you, but I can't really see what the problem is that you're having.

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;
use warnings;
use Log::Log4perl qw(get_logger);

my $conf = q(                                                         
+                            
    log4perl.category.testLog  = INFO, logApp
    log4perl.appender.logApp   = Log::Log4perl::Appender::File        
+ 
    log4perl.appender.logApp.mode     = append
    log4perl.appender.logApp.filename = test.log                      
    log4perl.appender.logApp.layout   = \
        Log::Log4perl::Layout::PatternLayout 
    log4perl.appender.logApp.layout.ConversionPattern - %m%n
);

Log::Log4perl::init(\$conf);

my $logger = get_logger('testLog');
$logger->error('This is better!');
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