Jill was born in Johannesburg South Africa.
She started riding at 6 years old at Jack and Bubbles van Hulsteyn’s stable Blue Hills Riding School in Johannesburg.
In 1971 she started competing in dressage and in 1973 was reserve junior champion.
In 1974 Jill began working at Blue Hills Riding School. The stable encouraged many facets of horsemanship including dressage, jumping, driving and liberty horses.
Jill also competed in combined driving, both in single harness and pairs. In 1976, 1977 and 1978 she won Single Harness Horse of the Year with a sponsor’s wonderful mare Molyslip Tanya.
In 1979 she spent one year as a working student for Dietrich von Hopffgarten in Vancouver, Canada.
After returning to South Africa in 1980 she joined the South African Lipizzaner Team in Johannesburg.
Through the Lipizzaner team she was accepted as a student at the Spanish Riding School in Vienna where she spent four months in 1981.
She returned to the Lipizzaner Team where she worked until the end of August 1983 when she moved to Los Angeles.
Jill has taught and competed in California  since 1984.