GoElvis.com,

There’s just something about Elvis Presley . . . still.

It’s 25 years since he died, but for months kids, born after his death, have been gobbling up his latest chart-topping single (albeit a remix). Tonight at his vigil, strangers too young to remember him alive will cry in public. And all week, grown men - and women - climb into stretchy jumpsuits and sing his songs.

I find I’m more and more pleased that I can say I was one of those who performed Sunday in the Superbowl of Elvis competitions, Images of the King.

There’s just something about Elvis that really appeals to men in that menopausal transition of their life.

But I think what separates Elvis Tribute Artists (ETA) from the guys garbling Burning Love at a karaoke bar, microphone in one hand, longneck in the other, is they get on stage and try to entertain for people.

And that’s what Elvis was all about.

The honored Memphis contest started as a straight business venture at Bad Bob’s, but grew into a sentimental favorite on the Elvis circuit.

It’s now at the Holiday Inn Select on Democrat Road, but Dr. Ed Franklin, the Presley family veterinarian, and wife Jackie still run the 15-year-old competition.

Jackie, who organizes the show, has a Southern kindness preventing her from turning down almost anyone.

“I can’t call somebody and say, `Sorry, you’re just too bad to be in the contest,’” she told me last year when I wrote my first story about ETAs. There were several moments just before stepping onstage I’d wished she hadn’t been so nice.

Get the professionals

Any young Elvis would be smart to call on a professional image consultant and movement coach before jumping up on stage. Mary Beth Banks at Dabbles salon in Overton Square and Courtney Oliver, a company member/PR director for Playhouse on the Square, provided incalculable expert direction.

Banks showed me how to erect my pompadour into the rigid, black mess it became.

Oliver recently coached an Elvis actor in the Playhouse production Idols of the King, and showed me how to shake like the King.

Neither should be held accountable for my inability to follow directions.

High anxiety

“It happens quite often that when I sing one of his gospel songs, people will cry,” Elvis contender Brandon Bennett said to me last year when I profiled him.

I felt relatively safe I wouldn’t have to deal with that, and not just because I my song was the sub-two-minute powerhouse Hard Headed Woman.

Pacing the “green room” with Elvis’s recording blaring out my Discman earphones and trying not to sweat hair dye onto the $1,400 loaner suit, I remembered Robert Lopez, aka El Vez, aka the Mexican Elvis, telling me about the old contest.

“In the old days, it was from 3 (p.m.) to 3 (a.m.), and every 20 minutes there’d be another Elvis,” he said. “It wasn’t a karaoke thing. People were doing it for the love of Elvis, like a real psychodrama on stage, it was folk art form of human parade.”

Not since then has it been as busy as this year, it appears. Sunday’s preliminary round, historically hard to fill, more than doubled the usual 10-performer limit - and there were three more full nights of prelims to follow.

I can’t really remember all of two-plus minutes of my performance. The steps to the stage. A few bored-looking women sitting stageside. The spotlights. Oh, and kissing the girls after my song. (It pays to have groupie shills.)

After I left the stage, everyone seemed more excited than me. One of the women I gave a kiss and a scarf said she was happy just to have been part of something like that.

With ETA humility, I passed the gratitude on to Elvis.

Reality check

I had been a musician, and even studied in a prestigious music program in college. It wasn’t hard passing the classes I took, but when the program director took me aside during a private lesson and told me that he was worried about my earning a living as a trumpet player, I started to let music slip away and focused on other pursuits.

I bring this up to point out that, though some might argue to the contrary, I know what bad is.

And I also know I’m not, well, good.

But for some reason, it didn’t matter.

So, how does it feel?

Last year I interviewed Elvises for an impersonator story, and I asked things like:

What is the raw emotion you get when you’re Elvis? Do you find people who wish you were Elvis? What does the power of impersonators say about Elvis and his fans? Now, tell me about your hair.

I can’t really answer these questions myself, other than that adrenaline is nice, and so are Elvis fans, generally speaking, and it’s not easy rolling a pompadour while sweating up a jumpsuit.

I found that most ETAs imitate the older, heavier 1970s Elvis because almost anybody can squeeze into a jumpsuit, wig, sideburns and glasses, and send out a King-like facade - even women, to some degree.

To do early Elvis, you really have to look like Elvis, and most of us just aren’t that lucky.

Also, Elvis’s vocal range grew a lot, so songs in his later catalog are easier for older men, believe it or not, because most just can’t sing the high notes Elvis hit as a young man.

My voice happens to climb up the register when I get excited, so my problem was singing low enough, something I thought I wouldn’t have to worry about after puberty.

The transformation

When I began the surreal transformation to Elvis, I reminded myself about the ETA pledge: I am not Elvis, I only honor him and his music. It helped me keep a healthy perspective.

At the end, I felt like Cameron Crowe’s character William Miller in Almost Famous, who slipstreamed himself backstage and into the inner sanctum of a rock band. After the concert he says his goodbyes to the rock stars like an old buddy.

“Later Jeff! See you, Dick. Larry. Ed. ‘Bye Mick, ‘bye Gregg, ‘bye Red Dog, Scully, Frosty, Estrella, The Wheel!”

Except for me it was, “see ya, David (Lee). Thanks Irv (Cass), Ronnie (Craig). Great show Elvis (Allynn).”

A great bunch of guys who were hospitable, friendly and encouraging, even though they had no assurance I wouldn’t make fun of them and what they do other than that I was an EP fan. Now I’m a brother, of sorts.

Brave? I don’t think so

During the contest, dressed as Elvis, strangers took my picture, posed with me and shook my hand. People still look at me differently. Coworkers giggle when they wave hello. And strangers send me E-mails after they see my Elvis on the newspaper’s Web site.

Everyone keeps telling me how brave I was, but I don’t see it that way.

During my research I stumbled on an underground guide Web site called vegashustler.com, which listed singing Elvis songs at a karaoke bar as No. 8 on its “Ten Things To Do In Vegas” list. (Also included were “get banned from a casino” and “spend a night in jail for a cool reason.”)

Competing in the ultimate Elvis competition, that was much cooler.

David Lee was right when he said that after I finished my decidedly short set I would wish I’d done more songs. But my Elvis was in the spirit of participatory journalism (more George Plimpton than Hunter Thompson).

I can boast my one credit as a tribute artist on my resume, but I don’t plan to add to it.

Not even if I find a killer Viva Las Vegas karaoke track.