Paton was born in November 1859 but in Partick, the sixth of thirteen children. His father was a sawyer cum joiner, born in Auchtermuchty in Fife but his mother came from Bonhilll, which might have been why they were very soon drawn or drawn back to Dumbarton and it was there that his six younger siblings were born. The family would be settled on Risk St., when at the age of twenty-one football opportunity opened up for the solid left-footer, astute in the tackle and good in distribution, which itself tells us how the Scottish game was already being played. His first cap would come in 1883 against England, the same season that the Scottish Cup would be won. A late replacement he did well and would between then and 1885 win four, albeit the last two perhaps on reputation rather than form.   

Already in 1881 in Dumbarton Michael was working as a student-teacher. Qualification, promotion and, indeed, personal life, would take him to Glasgow. In 1891 he would be a language teacher in the city. He was also be married in Kinross, the hometown of his bride Robina Lowe. They were to have five children, four boys and a girl, settling in Glasgow city-centre, he turning his sporting attention to golf and chess. However, in 1921 Robina would die in Dunfermline at the age of just fifty-seven, he sixty five. And he would remarry. His second wife, who he would in retirement wed in 1924 would be fellow teacher, Agnes Wiseman. However, Agnes would predecease him. She would die in 1942 in Cathcart at the age of seventy-seven. His passing would be in Provan in 1948 at the age of eighty-nine.