She’s a little young to be grasping the metaphysics of her fame, but not to recognize that she’s one of Disney’s hottest tickets at the moment. Hannah Montana is the highest-rated cable-TV series in the United States (it launched 18 months ago), and on network TV, for the tween audience, its numbers are second only to American Idol . In Canada, Family channel will only say it is one of its top shows, ranking consistently in the top three.

There’s a Hannah Montana feature film in the works, but it’s the music sales that shock everyone: The Hannah Montana soundtrack, recorded when Cyrus was 13, went double-platinum in the U.S. last year and went gold in Canada. The next album, Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus , has gone platinum in the U.S. and Canada. It’s a two CD-set: One has songs she sings on the show as Hannah, the other has music written and sung by Cyrus as herself.