The story of real paper started in South East Asia. Similar to the people of Egypt, the Chinese had, almost fifty centuries in the past, developed a form of pictographic writing. They also had been making use of various kinds of objects to scribe upon, most commonly strips of bamboo and woven silk and it is possible that the barkcloth they utilized for other uses from the Paper. Mulberry was also used.
Historical documentation points to the fact that in 105AD a member of the government going by the name of Tsai Lung, invented usable paper, though it seems from archaeological discoveries that it was in fact in existence in what is now the People's Republic of China for more than likely two hundred years before Tsai Lung.
During ancient times gone by setting down words was mainly done on some derivative of bamboo or on lengths of silk, which were called Ji in those days. However, the prohibitive cost of silk and bamboo being too weighty, these two materials were inconvenient. Around then Tsai Lun thought of utilizing bark from trees, fish nets, hemp, and rags. In 105 years after the birth of Christ he delivered a report to the emperor on the process of paper manufacture and got many accolades for his abilities. Consequently, from that time paper has been used in almost every place on earth and is called the "paper of Marquis Tsai".
If indeed this title is correct or not, will likely never be uncovered! Nevertheless the main consideration has to be that they discovered that if they ground particular substances taken from plant material in to a mush, separate unwanted materials, place the mush in liquid, screen it onto textile sheets giving it time to dry. After the drying process was complete, it congealed into a hard, resilient sheet that turned out to be surprisingly light, and providing it did not come into contact with water, turned out to be remarkably durable.
It's a fact that this very simple of papermaking technologies is even now practised in exactly a similar way in and around Nepal and Tibet, the initial regions to learn the techniques from China. A basic frame makes use of a cotton cloth pulled and held over one side, very watery grume is poured into the far end and moved around until it has reached a level. Then it is left hanging that will enable the water to drain and the pulp to dry in to a sheet of parchment which may be removed by peeling.
There came a time when a very talented individual worked out that building a frame with ribs and putting a delicate removable bamboo mat across it, would let the paper-making procedure to be accelerated enormously. Instead of using a single mold for each paper sheet, consequently severely restricting the number of sheets that may be produced at the same time, a stack of sieved mache was able to be built up a layer at a time, with just a piece of cotton thread between them to help with later separation. The stack would then be pressed very slightly, and every layer of paste moved to a place to dry.