Jill Elizabeth Stevenson, later Bilcock, was born in 1948 in Horsham, Victoria, Australia. Her family, which included Jill and two brothers, moved to Melbourne when she was three, and her father left the family when she was four. Her mother worked full-time as a teacher at a technical school, and went to the University of Melbourne at night to complete a degree in commerce. Artists, poets, and authors visited their home regularly. She later said that she "didn't have a lot of parenting".
She is a graduate of the Swinburne Film and Television School (1968), entering its first film course at the age of 17, after leaving school and enrolling at Swinburne Technical College at the age of 15, encouraged by her mother. She went on a student trip to China, which at the time was in the throes of the Cultural Revolution, and generally closed to foreigners; she became an honorary Red Guard there. When Brian Robinson started the first film course at Swinburne, she jumped at it. There she met Fred Schepisi, who was one of the examiners.
