The story of real paper happened in what is now the People's Republic of China. Like the Egyptians, the Chinese had, virtually 5000 years ago, developed a style of pictographic writing. The Egyptians too had been utilizing many different things to scribe on, notably pieces of bamboo and silk woven into a fine fabric and possibly the barkcloth they used for other purposes from the Paper. Mulberry was ased too.
Legend tells us that in 105AD a member of the government by the name of Tsai Lung, brought out usable paper, although it seems from archaeological finds that it was in fact in existence in South East Asia for probably two centuries prior to Tsai Lung.
In ancient times gone by scribing was usually on some derivative of bamboo or sometimes on strips of silk, which were called Ji in those days. However, the soaring cost of silk and bamboo being very weighty, these two materials were inconvenient. Around then Tsai Lun thought of making use of bark, hemp, fish nets, and rags. In 105 years after the birth of Christ he delivered a report to the emperor on the process of paper making and received high praise for his thoughts. From that time paper has been used universally and is called the "paper of Marquis Tsai".
If indeed this title is correct, will likely never be known! Nevertheless the important consideration must be that it was discovered that if they pounded certain substances derived from plant matter into a grume, take out unwanted materials, place the grume in liquid, screen it out onto fabric sheets giving it time to dry. When fully dried, it dried into a hard, durable sheet that was exceedingly light, and providing it did not get damp or wet, proved decidedly dense.
This the easiest of papermaking technologies is even now in use in exactly the same way within Nepal and Tibet, the first regions to make use of the technolgies from China. A basic frame makes use of a cloth manufactured from cotton made to stretch over a side, watery paste is emptied in to the far side and moved around until it has reached a level. After which it is left in order for it to let the water to drain and the mush to dry in to a sheet of parchment which can be removed by stripping off.
By and by an extremely clever individual worked out that building a frame with an arrangement of ribbing and placing a delicate replaceable bamboo mat across it, would allow the process to be quickened incredibly. Instead of using one mould for each paper sheet, severely restricting the amount of sheets that could be produced at one time, a stack of sieved pulp could be built up a layer at a time, with just a strip of cotton thread between them which would help with separation at a later time. The stack would then be pressed lightly, and every sheet of mache moved to a board to dry.