Can't erase folders or files on an external USB

I am using an external HD, USB on my iMAC and SL OS. This evening, an hour ago, I was updating some catalogues using Adobe Lightroom, when all of a sudden a get a dialogue saying that Lightroom cannot continue as I am short of space on the HD (the external USB one, where I keep all my raw files and Lightroom catalogues).
So I shut LR, went to finder and discovered that I had little space left. I then started erasing folders and files that I did not need and which should have totaled the liberation of around 15 GB of disk space. However, when I checked the available disk space, "getting info", I found out that the HD was still short of space, even though I erased all those folders and files.
I unmounted the HD, connected it to a PC and in the explorer window and under "My Computer", found some folders that I did not visualize on the MAC: folders such as ".Trash", ".something or the other"... etc, about 4 folders all together, all of which preceded by a dot.
I then erased them, under Windows (yuck..) and went back to my MAC. Yes sir: I had 15 GB of free space then.
So, my question is:
1. Why couldn't I "free" space on the USB HD deleting folders and files?
2. Why couldn't I "see" those funny folders beginning with a dot, such as ".trash" under MAC but could see them and eliminate them under Windows... (yuck, again)
3. How to avoid such a nuisance in the future?
Thank you guys, have a nice day.

files and folders that start with dot are normally hidden in finder. you really don't want to see them all the time, trust me. they are system files and folders that you don't normally need to see. to see trashed items just open trash in the dock. but if you want to take a look run the following terminal command
defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles 1; killall Finder
to hide them back (as I'm sure you'll want to soon) change 1 to 0 in the command.

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