"SO, there's a thing called the Hollywood sign and obviously there's a letter 'H' at the beginning of it.
"If I was to stand at the top of the 'H' I could look down on to my house. I guess you could say I'm just under the H."
Craig Young is trying to describe the exact spot on which his Hollywood home sits.
It's around 5,350 miles from his native town where his roots lie.
The actor was born in the Queen's Medical Centre, raised on Farnborough Road in Clifton and lived in the city until he was 17 years old.
With his mother working as manageress of JB's bingo hall in Clifton and his father a miner at Cotgrave pit, his beginnings were relatively humble.
Clifton was also where he attended Milford Primary School and Fairham Community College, before moving to London to realise his childhood dream of becoming an actor.
Via a brush with pop stardom and national TV, Craig now finds himself living the Hollywood lifestyle at full throttle – quite literally.
The 37-year-old is playing the lead role in Jaguar's latest car commercial, which sees him as a villainous character, racing Jaguar's latest XFR model.
He recalls how his dreams of success began back home in his living room.
"I used to sit and watch Top Of The Pops every Thursday night," he says.
"I remember one time closing my eyes and wishing I could be on stage.
"My first acting job was when I was 10 years old at the Nottingham Playhouse with a play called The Price of Coal." It was the first production of the then artistic director Kenneth Alan Taylor.
By the time he turned 17, Craig had decided to pursue a career in acting and headed for drama college in London.
He got a job at a restaurant to fund his course, but a chance encounter at work meant his time at college came to a halt after just three months.
"One day I'm serving this kid in the restaurant and he said, 'Hey, I'm looking for a blond guy to come and be a part of this band, would you be interested?' It was as simple as that," he recalls.
The band in question would become 90s pop group Deuce.
They went on to score four top 30 singles – including "I Need You" which reached number 10 in April 1995 – and appeared on TV shows including GMTV and, more importantly for Craig, Top Of The Pops.
But despite working with Tom Watkins, manager of acclaimed acts like East 17 and Pet Shop Boys, things took a disappointing turn.
"It started off all bells and whistles and fantasy-like really," he recalls.
"When I got into the nitty gritty of it, people's egos started to get in the way. There were a lot of rules and regulations and the style was very much manipulated."
He adds: "But when I look back I made some amazing friends along the way and I got to live my boyhood dream of being on Top Of The Pops. How many people can say that, right?"
While performing on GMTV, Craig became friendly with the show's executive producer.
And once Deuce was done with, he was offered a role introducing cartoons and interviewing pop groups on the show.
As fun as this was, Craig decided he had to get back into acting.
Before long, his manager had arranged an audition with Sky's former football-themed TV drama series, Dream Team.
The producers decided to write Craig his own 'bad boy' character, named Alex. "Alex had just come out of a youth offenders' institute and was from Nottingham so I could revert back to my original accent.
"He'd be always starting fights, rumours, or spiking drinks."
During the filming of Dream Team, Craig would travel back and forth to LA to visit a friend.
And he recalls the moment when his love affair with The Golden State ignited.
"The first time I visited him was in '98 and I remember touching down in LAX and seeing the sizzling mirage on the runway and it sent shivers down my spine," he says.
"I was like 'Oh my god, this is it, this is where I want to be' – there was just something in me telling me that.
"I find that if you set yourself goals, things happen. That little kid who was sat watching Top Of The Pops, he set himself a goal.
"The same thing happened in America.
"Once I got out there I gave myself a week to get an agent, and if it presented itself then it was meant to be.
"If it didn't then I would have gone back to London. I was 25 and very decisive."
Luckily for Craig, he found an agent during his first week. He flew back to the UK to complete his contract with Dream Team, before returning to LA, where he went to live with his friend.
How did his family take the news? "I think they've always seen me as a bit of a risk taker. I'm the youngest of five and I used to joke by saying I'm a kind of latchkey kid.
"Mum would have been a bit worried because America just seems like a massive place, but they came out to visit me within the first three months to make sure I wasn't living in a crack den."
His first job in LA was with MTV's first scripted show in America, in which he played a drug dealer – he admits there seems to be a recurring theme amongst the characters he's played.
Times were tough and he got by with small part-time jobs. Then his luck began to turn.
"My big break came with the show Charmed, where I played Rose McGowan's boyfriend, which moved me into another league," he says.
Then he landed a role in what would become a global TV hit – the critically-acclaimed drama Lost, about the survivors of a plane crash on a mysterious tropical island.
"We filmed Lost in Hawaii and the cast and crew were really friendly," he says.
"It was a time when I had to pinch myself a lot, knowing that I was on the number one show in America."
Craig now runs Brits In LA – a company which helps British people settle in the city, by finding them accommodation, transportation and health insurance.
And it was through this that he got the opportunity to film street races in downtown LA by taking the leading role in Jaguar's latest car commercial.
All of this sounds a million miles away from life in Clifton, to which he returns at least once a year to visit his family who still live there.
But despite the distance he's come, he doesn't forget his roots: "I still consider Nottingham my home. It's kind of just in you, you know? You can't let go of it."
