Short answers, pulled from the story.
The Penny Black was first issued in the United Kingdom on the 1st of May 1840 but was not valid for use until the 6th of May 1840. Some post offices, including those in Bath, sold the stamps unofficially before the authorized date.
The portrait on the Penny Black was engraved by Charles Heath and his son Frederick, based on a sketch by Henry Corbould. Corbould's sketch drew on William Wyon's 1834 cameo-like portrait of Queen Victoria. The overall design was endorsed by Sir Rowland Hill, who proposed the stamp system.
The Penny Black lasted less than a year because its red cancellation ink was hard to see on the black design and could be washed off, allowing stamps to be re-used. In February 1841 the Treasury switched to the Penny Red and began using black cancellation ink, which was far more effective and difficult to remove.
The total print run of the Penny Black was 286,700 sheets, containing 68,808,000 individual stamps. The sheets were printed by Perkins Bacon in 240-stamp sheets of 20 rows and 12 columns.
The United Kingdom omits its name on postage stamps because it issued the world's first adhesive stamp, the Penny Black, and the monarch's image was accepted as sufficient identification of the country of origin. The UK remains the only country in the world to follow this practice.
The VR official stamp was a version of the Penny Black produced for government correspondence, with the letters V and R replacing the Maltese crosses in the upper corners. It was largely abandoned after the public ridiculed the rival Mulready stationery and surplus sheets were diverted to government departments instead. Only a handful of postally used VR examples survive.