As an example of USAsians non-use of the word until recently, I remember the (unintentional) hilarity at school when we discovered that Mork and Mindy's landlord was Arnold Wanker.

BTW 'Wanker' was originally school slang for a bloater or a derivation of 'Wonker' a useless naval cadet. The modern usage comed from 'Whanker' (military slang) and seems to have lost the h since the Second World War