The history of real paper happened in South East Asia. Like the people of Egypt, the Chinese had, nearly 50 centuries ago, developed a style of writing that used images. They also had been making use of several types of objects to write upon, usually strips of bamboo and processed silk and possibly the barkcloth they used for other reasons derived out of the Paper. Mulberry was made use of too.
Legend leads us to believe that in 105 years after the birth of Christ an official by the name of Tsai Lung, created usable paper, though it appears from archaeological discoveries that in fact it was around in China for probably two hundred years prior to Tsai Lung.
Way back in ancient times gone by setting down words or pictograms was mainly on some form of bamboo or occasionally on lengths of silk, which were known as Ji then. Nonetheless the great price of silk and bamboo being too weighty, these two materials were not convenient. Then Tsai Lun thought of using the bark from trees, rags, fish nets, and hemp. In 105AD he made a report to the emperor with regard to the production of paper and got high accolade for his ability. Consequently, since those days paper has been availed of every place and is called the "paper of Marquis Tsai".
Whether this particular claim is accurate, will likely not ever be known! But the main factor is that the discovery was made that they could grind certain compounds derived from plants into a mash, extract impure materials, float the mash in water, filter it onto textile sheets and give it time to dry out. After the drying process was complete, it calcified into a firm, tenacious sheet that turned out to be very light, and as long as it was not allowed to come into contact with water, turned out to be decidedly robust.
This the most simple of papermaking techniques is even now practised in exactly the same way within Tibet and Nepal, the first countries to take the craft from what is now the People's Republic of China. A simple frame has a type of cotton cloth stretched over a single side, very watery grume is poured in to the far side and spread around until it is smooth. It is then left suspended so that it will allow the liquid to leave it and the mush to dry into a parchment sheet which can be taken off.
By and by a very talented individual realized that making a frame with ribbing and putting in place a fine bamboo mat that is replaceable across this, would let the process to be accelerated incredibly. Instead of tying up a single mould for each paper sheet, consequently severely limiting the number of sheets that may be made at the same time, a stack of sieved paste was able to be built up layer upon layer, with just a piece of cotton thread between them in order to enable later separation. The stack would then be squeezed very slightly, and every sheet of mache shifted to a dry board.