How Long Would It Take for a Star to Form, Given That It's a Slow, Gradual Process?

The only reason it's hard to get out into space is that you have nothing to push against once you take that first jump. So maybe we should do space ladders instead of these big old, fancy rockets. But there really is technology. If you can assemble a cable which connects the surface of the earth to like, some huge rock out there in orbit, then you can build an elevator that just climbs that cable. It doesn't take nearly as much energy. That would really suck though, if you were onlye the space elevator and someone pressed all the buttons, cause that would take like years. But it's only two buttons. There's earthd space.