My baby brother used to play the Limberjack, he learned from Jeff Warner. He would put only about 1-2 inches of the board under his thigh as close to the knee as possible, at about a 45-degree angle, drape his opposite arm over his leg to tap the board (so he was hitting the board behind the little man), and hold the little man's stick in his same hand.

Don't know how articulate that sounded; I mean if he sat with his right leg on the board, draped his left hand over to hit the board, and held the little man's stick with his right hand. :-) Since my brother learned from Jeff, I can safely assume that this is the way Jeff's Apalachian sources played it. (Jeff is a stickler for detail)