If IOS and Safari work the same on your iPad as on my iPhone, you should be able to choose and insert an emoji by hitting the emoji “shift” key at the lower left of the keypad and then choosing which of the many, many available emojis you want.
🗿 Me dumdum 🎩 hat tip to you, AZLiberty 👍🏻 found the emoji shift key 🙈 before emoji-able 😳 post emojii-able Thanks.