Re: Bah!
Umm, it's just a english idiom rougly meaning, in this context, something like "seriously" or maybe "professionally" and implying that this was when he got seriously stuck into that business. I think originally it was used to distinguish between practice and "for real". For example "shots fired in anger" meaning you were shooting at someone with intent as opposed to just practicing.
(Here's hoping that was a genuine language misunderstanding and I haven't missed some joke and patronisingly explained it to you anyway!)