My parents never used a frame. They worked sitting at a table. They used to lay the worked part on the table, with the part with the rest of the design outline drawn on it hanging down on their knees. The tool to pierce the hessian and catch the fabric strips (apparently it is called a bodger) was pushed through a quarter/or half-inch fold of hessian closed, opened to catch the end of the strip and pulled back until the ends were even. When a row was finished, the work was moved on a fraction to keep the next line at the edge of the table.
I have seen these bodgers on Ebay and Amazon too. They are like fine-nosed pliers, with one half of the nose longer and pointed to go through the hessian and a spring to keep it closed while you pull through. £20 new or £8 for a rusty vintage one. There must be some in charity shops with no-one aware of what they are.