It’s not a dumb question at all! No such a thing.

First, the distinction between Colonialism and Imperialism: the former is where settlements are established on other people’s land, often (but not always) for the purposes of profit. Imperialism is the act of one government exerting control over another or another population. There are two methods: hard power (use of force) and soft power (use of incentives). The British government’s occupation of Egypt was imperialistic but not colonial because there was no policy of creating English settlements.

Egypt in the 1870’s was a vassal state of the Ottoman Empire but in the midst of a rising sense of Egyptian identity. The government was also having cash troubles which was bringing it more under the sway of the British and French governments. It was hoped that this could in part be alleviated by expanding the state’s export income, but they had also had to take out lots of loans with the aforementioned Western governments and bankers from those countries; measures undertaken to try to stave off increasing encroachment into Egyptian politics by the UK and French governments, such as higher taxation, were mostly unsuccessful (Ibrahim, 1967: 336-337; 335; 342).

One of the reasons the Khedivate was so in debt was because the construction of the Suez Canal (by a French corporation) had cost much more than expected. The Canal was considered a threat by the British government because it would remove from them their hegemony over maritime commercial routes and give more power to French businessmen and the French government (Munro, 1901: 33-34). However, if they had more control over it, then it could be advantageous - they’d retain control of trade and the route to India would be better secured.

In 1875, the Ottoman Empire’s government declared bankruptcy. The heavily in debt Egyptian vassal leader, Khedive Isma’il Pasha, needed money fast, and considered selling his 44% share of the Suez Canal Company to French investors. The British government swiftly purchased it to stop that from happening, and so gained a measure of control over a threat to their global hegemony (Hicks, 2012: 184).

The next year, with a financial stranglehold over the Egyptian government, the British and French governments began exerting more control over its internal politics: they put their own representatives into the Egyptian Cabinet and its finances came under control of a board of British and French “advisors”. When Isma’il Pasha tried to do something about this he was deposed and replaced with his son who would be more cooperative with the British and French governments. The financial “advisors” believed that the Egyptian army had to be downsized to save money, which led to a mutiny led by Colonel ‘Urabi Pasha (Hauffaker, 2012: 377).

Remember, there was a rising feeling of Egyptian identity, and this mutiny had widespread support of the peasantry because ‘Urabi rose up the ranks from the very bottom of Egyptian society, so was viewed as a “man of the people”. In 1881, ‘Urabi had forced the Khedive to accept his demands for political reform and became the Minister of War in early 1882. This was a nationalist revolution against foreign government interference, but ‘Urabi presented a moderate sounding manifesto (one allegedly written by an English intellectual supportive of his revolution) which accepted ‘the European control as a necessity’ when it came to Egypt’s economy, but that the power these foreign governments held was only temporary and he would ‘gradually redeem the country out of the hands of its creditors’ (Pinfari, 2012: 95).

Naturally, the British and French government’s weren’t too happy about this because it put their control of the Egyptian government at risk, as well as their profits in the Suez Canal Company, and their control of the Suez Canal itself. To cut a long story short, there was a war between ‘Urabi’s forces and the British government, the former lost, and foreign government control was re-established.

So, that’s how imperial control was established, now for your other questions!

The most important thing to remember is that Empires don’t exist to make the world a better place, but to make the imperial government more rich and/or powerful. Egypt was geostrategically and financially useful to the British government, but British Prime Minister, William Gladstone, didn’t want to occupy Egypt indefinitely.

He had no plans to improve Egyptians’ lives, allow them to travel the empire etc. He wanted to re-establish the Khedive’s authority and return to the pre-’Urabi status quo, thus safeguarding UK government interests without a military presence. But an inquiry argued the Khedive’s position was so weak and financially precarious that British troops in Egypt were exactly what was required for stabilisation. The inquiry argued that Egypt should be built-up by the British government for the good of Egyptians because they weren’t able to do it themselves (Carman, 1921: 54-55). This is known as “The White Man’s Burden” - the racist theory that White people know what’s best for Black people and have to show them how to live properly and “advance” their societies. The ideology underpinned many colonialist initiatives.

The political system of Egyptian government would remain - a vassal to the Ottoman government, the Khedive in control (though the British government had final say), the judicial system remained etc - but British officials were at every level of government. The military also saw British officers leading native troops.

Originally, because the British government hadn’t intended to stay in Egypt for any length of time other than to stabilise the situation for their geostrategic and commercial interests, there’d been no plans to improve the lives of the Egyptian people - the British government couldn’t have cared less about it. However, once they decided that they had to stay in order to ensure their control over the unstable government, some changes were made: slavery and forced labour were abolished, military corruption was dealt with, prison conditions were brought more in line with British prisons (which is still not saying much to be honest), hospital conditions were improved, infrastrucutre was improved, education reformed, and other things too (Carman, 1921: 55-56).

These reforms were brought in by the British ruler of Egypt, Evelyn Baring, the Lord Cromer. He was in charge from 1883-1907. He originally also wanted a swift British military withdrawal, but once the British government felt it had to stay (and got embroiled in the Sudanese Mahdist Revolt), decided to make some reforms. But don’t think that this was because he cared about Egyptian liberty - he cared about imperial security, and believed that an occupation of Egypt (which he called a ‘burden’) was a threat to it. But he was also an avid follower of the White Man’s Burden theory, and felt that it was up to White people to show the non-White Egyptian people how their country and lives should be run and structured (Tignor, 1963: 144-146).

I don’t know all that much about the rest of the period up to independence in 1922, but for the next thirty years British politicians were still proclaiming that they needed to withdraw from Egypt and let it run itself, but literally never did. British government control was still strong right up to the 1950's.

So, that’s very briefly how it went down in Egypt. The British did give the population stuff in return, but certainly not to be nice. It was all about making Egypt’s government stable for the benefit of British government interests. Many things in Egypt stayed as they were (with some legal changes - not sure about currency though) and those things which did change all revolved around the British government’s global power position. Of course, colonialism and imperialism happened in all different ways in different times and places. In Asante in the 1890’s, for example, at the same time the British government were looking to ensure continued stable government in Egypt by Egyptians, they were excluding the Asante leadership from governance; in both places because the British government saw it in their interests.

Anyway, I hope this helps!