Ernest left school early and moved to London, where he worked as a baker's assistant and was able to watch music hall performances by Dan Leno and others.
He joined a touring comedy troupe, the Six Brothers Luck, who also included Shaun Glenville, and in 1901 Lotinga married another popular music hall entertainer, the male impersonator Hetty King.
[1][2] In 1909, after a poorly-received tour of the United States with the Six Brothers Luck, Lotinga left the troupe, and developed his own act as the character Jimmy Josser, an "irreverent everyman".
The Lord Chamberlain's Office described the show as "a farrago of idiocy, vulgarity and sham sentiment", and Lotinga was obliged to rewrite the script.
"[4] He was also portrayed, in character, in the final panel of the sculptural frieze by Gilbert Baynes, Drama Through The Ages, on the Saville Theatre in Shaftesbury Avenue.