Women are getting more independent in these modern days so "Miss" means the woman is single, and "Ms." could be a single woman or a married woman. If you were to send a letter to someone and you weren't sure if the woman was married or not you would put "Ms. Smith." Also, some women today are also keeping their surnames after marriage (go by their surname and not their husbands last name) while others will link their surname with that of their new husbands. Eg: Her name is Smith and his is Johnson, so she'd go by "Mary Smith-Johnson." Some women will do this especially if they are in business.
"Miss" and "Mrs" are both contractions of "Mistress". "Ms", pronounced "mizz", appeared in the early 20th century as further contraction of both titles which is independent of marital status. [SOED 6th ed]
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