Actress/singer Jennifer Lopez

I've put off including J-Lo on this blog for far too long.

Jennifer Lopez is easily the most famous American entertainer of Hispanic descent on the planet.  The Bronx-born daughter of migrants from Puerto Rico, J-Lo (it's become cool for contemporary celebrities to go by their first initials and the first syllables of their surnames, apparently) began as a dancer on the TV sketch comedy show "In Living Color" before playing the murdered Tejano singer Selena Quintanilla Perez in the 1997 movie Selena.  The role made her a star; from there she appeared in movies such as The Cell, The Wedding Planner, and Angel Eyes, as well as Steven Soberbergh's Out Of Sight (1998), which featured her in her critically acclaimed performance as Elmore Leonard's U.S. Marshal character Karen Sisco (and paired her with George Clooney).       

As a dance-pop singer, she's released seven long play records as of this writing, featuring hits such as "If You Had My Love," "Waiting For Tonight," Love Don't Cost a Thing," and, of course, "Jenny From the Block," a declaration of how success hasn't changed her.  

Fun fact: J-Lo's 1999 debut album, On the 6, got its title from the fact that she took the number 6 rapid transit line in New York to get to dance and vocal classes.  It's safe to assume that, had she grown up in the suburbs, her first album would have been titled In the Dodge Caravan . . . and it wouldn't have been very danceable.