In American law, paying the taxes is an important point in adverse possession.
Adverse and hostile - ie you not asking permission
Continuous and exclusive - going on the property occasionally will not satisfy it. The adverse possessor must be on the property continuously. Also the adverse possessor is not sharing it with others or claiming to be part of a group which owns it.
Open and Notorious - it can't be secret or hidden. You have to be doing it openly such that others can see you're using the property. Several states require that you have paid the property taxes to satisfy this.
For the statutory period....10 years in common law more or less depending on the state.
There was a famous case of this when somehow the plot map of properties a developer put out was one lot off from the plot map that was filed with the state. The upshot was everybody for several whole neighborhoods did not really own the house they were in. They actually owned their neighbor's house next door.
Not a problem you say? It was potentially a big problem. Not every house was exactly the same. If you were on a smaller lot or had a less expensive house than your neighbor, you had a financial incentive to make a claim to your neighbor's house and land.
The Court ruled that every homeowner owned his home by adverse possession and that this therefore quieted title....ie nobody can press any claims that might otherwise have been technically legal but.....c'mon....that would have been scummy and would have caused chaos. Courts do not like instability and chaos and for public policy reasons, will take steps to prevent it whenever they can.