Eyewitness: It was 4.45 on a beautiful, sunny evening when they began to chant his name: "Giovanni Paolo, Giovanni Paolo . . ." A surge of emotion rippled through the crowd. The vast, packed square seemed to hold its breath.
Suddenly, a tiny, despairing nun began to claw her way towards the front of our densely packed corral. Two women bickered furiously with a man blocking their view with his camera. Only the "Papa Boys" - the young men and women who had joyfully celebrated the jubilee with the Holy Father during those memorable days in 2000 - seemed able to carry on with what sounded like a football chant - "Giovanni Paolo, Giovanni Paolo."
The moment everyone in this square had been waiting for, for long hours and days, had come. The man they knew and loved as Giovanni Paolo was being returned to his people.
The precisely choreographed appearance of the Swiss Guards in the ornate majesty of St Peter's Square signified that the great public pageantry had begun. Around the square, large screens relayed pictures of the ceremonies as the last public appearance of Pope John Paul II was prepared.
As the screens charted his approach, each close-up of his face drew emotional applause. As the procession wound its way through the richly appointed salons and magnificent corridors and drew nearer the waiting crowd, the tension increased.
Then into the sunlight at last and back to the faithful, came the man they longed to see for one last time. A million cameras and camera phones were raised in readiness.
But for all the incongruity of modern technology, the imposing architecture, the swelling organ music, the tolling bells, the procession of richly robed princes of the church that preceded his entry and the gold pillows on which his mitred head was laid, to this crowd it was, in the end, a dearly loved man who was carried past by the pall-bearers.
Against all the odds, amid the fragrance of incense, it was an intensely personal moment. Tears were quietly wiped away. The bickering women kissed each other solemnly. The tiny nun sobbed silently into a handkerchief.
It was only then, as the screens showed the cardinals file past their beloved Giovanni Paolo inside the basilica, that the people learned that their chance to do the same would not come until 9pm - nearly another four hours. Some had been there for days, most had been standing for hours in the heat.
Nina Soledad, a 63-year-old who had arrived from Cordoba in Spain late the night before and had been here since 7am, remained serene: "The Pope has gone through so many things, what is this but a little sacrifice that I can do to thank God for giving him to us for such a long time? I will wait here with my daughters because we want to say our last prayers for him to God . . . And I need to say goodbye."