His father, a businessman, lived in the Wirral; he was educated at Marlborough College, before going up to Downing College, Cambridge where he read Law, and played hockey for the college and performed with the Footlights.
While at Cambridge, he was active in the Footlights where he collaborated with Mark Evans, Sue Perkins, Andy Parsons, Alexander Armstrong and Ben Miller, and had served as vice-president and revue director.
While a first-year doctoral student, he joined the Footlights in 1981 and was a contemporary of Tony Slattery and Neil Mullarkey.
Her first TV appearance was in 1982 in a sketch show There's Nothing To Worry About! which later became Alfresco (where Robbie Coltrane replaced the ex-Footlights actor Paul Shearer).
They were then recruited in 1988, along with fellow former Footlights member David Baddiel and his comedy partner Rob Newman, to write and perform a satirical sketch and stand-up show called The Mary Whitehouse Experience on BBC Radio 1.