"How does all this work?"

Well, the answer can be simple or complex depending on how much detail you want.

Basically, every website you visit is a collection of files on a computer somewhere. It "lives" on that "host" computer. The host computer is usually designed and dedicated to the job of "serving" websites, which is why it is called a "server".

When a person tells their computer to go to the "XYZ website" what they have done is to instruct their computer to locate and connect with one certain computer on the internet. When your computer arrives at that computer, the two will "talk" and work out the details of how they will continue to talk with each other. They actually Negotiate what Protocols (out of many) they both have and can use to continue communicating with each other. Your computer then asks to be taken to the XYZ website that lives on that computer. (There can be one or many websites living on a single computer depending on how that server is set up.)

When you reach the website you want to "visit" the rest becomes easier. A website's "pages" are, for the most part, individual files much like the ones on your own computer. When you click a link you are telling XYZ website to let you see the file which that link points to. A website can be as small as one page or have thousands upon thousands of pages (Think IBM, Microsoft, the Government, etc. here).

Go back one page.