His distinguishing features included a garishly-coloured jacket, a clown's nose made of a table tennis ball, and a yellowed Finnish matriculation cap.
He often appeared to use intoxicants, often behind the scenes but sometimes also in plain view: In one sketch, he crouched behind his desk to smoke a cigarette during the show, in another—while trying to do magic tricks—he claimed his alcoholic beverage to be a "magic potion" helping him to perform the tricks, and in one sketch he had created a chime instrument out of half-empty liquor bottles and had to repeatedly "tune" his instruments by sipping from the bottles.
At one time, Nasse-setä explained how he had ended up as host of a children's show: on the day when he was at a career fitting test, the meters were out of order.
According to word of mouth, he hated children in real life, but in the radio shows he hosted it was, of course, never revealed.
For the 2004 Turhapuro film, Vesa-Matti Loiri put on Nasse-setä make-up for the first time in years.