[1] Lee's first role was in the Our Gang comedy short Mike Fright[1] as a tap dancer in a sailor suit.
Lee continued acting throughout the 1930s, appearing in a number of movies (among others: Too Many Parents, Easy to Take, Three Cheers for Love, Silk Hat Kid, The Big Broadcast of 1937, Sons of the Legion, Say It in French, Boy Trouble, Night Work, Sudden Money, Nobody's Children, Hold Back the Dawn, Nevada City, Road to Happiness) and working alongside some of Hollywood's finest, including, Donald O'Connor, Lon Chaney Jr., Roy Rogers, Charles Boyer, Randolph Scott, Lew Ayres, Gene Autry, Robert Cummings, Basil Rathbone, Olivia de Havilland, John Boles, Fred MacMurray, Ray Milland and Broderick Crawford).
[2] In addition to being an actor, he was also a singer and dancer, appearing and singing with Bobby Breen in Make a Wish and touring with vaudeville shows.
For his role in Cocoanut Grove he learnt to play the drums and formed the Billy Lee Band.
[1] The band appeared in the 1941 film, Reg'lar Fellers,[1] in which he starred with co-star Carl Switzer.