The table was not building due to missing the line in the HTML header:
<script type="text/javascript" src="./includes/tablesorter-master/js/widgets/widget-build-table.js"></script>
The PHP script is absolutely fine. The only JavaScript req'd is:
$(document).ready(function(){
$.getJSON('./get_data.php',function(data){
applyTable(data);
});
});
function applyTable(arrayIn){
$('#topdiv').tablesorter({
theme: 'default',
//widgets : ['zebra','columns'],
debug: true,
widgetOptions: {
build_source: arrayIn,
build_headers: {
rows: 1
}
}
});