My night at the TV Academy Hall of Fame dinner...

As you know, I was one of those kids who watched so much television in the 70s that I can recite entire scenes from shows like "The Brady Bunch," "The Mary Tyler Moore Show" and, of course, "I Love Lucy." Hell, I even know lines from "The Flintstones" okay?

So basically, attending last night's Television Academy Hall of Fame ceremony was heaven on Earth. I got to tell Carl Reiner how timeless "The Dick Van Dyke Show" is and tell Lily Tomlin how frustrated I am that her "12 Miles of Bad Road" series never made it to air. Then there was the lovely lady Florence Henderson who, when she saw me, gave me a big hug then instructed by friend Beth on exactly how to take our picture. "You'll want to get closer so you can see who we are."

And this was all before the ceremony even started!

Beth and I arrived at the Beverly Hills Hotel just as the cocktail party was starting and quickly found ourselves mingling with the likes of Norman Lear and honoree Sherwood Schwartz. We then headed out to the arrivals line outside so I could do a few interviews. Gabbed with: the handsome James Denton who was the evening's host; with Tony Griffin who was there to accept the award for his late dad, Merv Griffin; with Sherwood Schwartz about his classic shows "Gilligan's Island" and "The Brady Bunch."

Beth went over to the other side of the line to snap a photo of the glorious Angela Lansbury and Beatrice Arthur as they arrived. They never made it to the other side of the line and only did a few one-on-ones inside with TV crews.

Lansbury, a TV Hall of Fame member herself, inducted Miss Arthur, the Emmy winning star of the classic sitcoms "Maude" and "The Golden Girls."

"She's one of the few television actors to get a second act. Most actors are lucky to get one defining series," Lansbury said of her friend, with whom she co-starred on Broadway in "Mame" in the 60s. "She personally has caused me to laugh as I have never laughed before."

Arthur remarked during her acceptance speech: "To be a success in this business, you need two things: talent and luck and I've been very, very lucky."

One awkward moment before the ceremony came when Florence Henderson was doing interviews and Christopher Knight arrived. He took one look at her and made a beeline out of there. He publicly scolded his TV mom some months back for remarks she made about his marriage to Adrianne Curry. Knight, 51, was stopped by a TV Guide reporter before he could make a complete escape so when Florence made her way inside, they were face-to-face. Ever the pro, she posed for photos with him and you'd never know anything was wrong.

Then I overheard Knight telling the TV Guide dude the real story behind the feud: "She has made statements about the validity of our marriage and it puts me in the position where I have to make a decision." I stopped listening at that point wanting to say: "Oh Peter Brady grow up!"

Anyway,Henderson inducted Schwartz at the ceremony with not only kind words, but sang the "Brady Bunch" theme song with special lyrics that she wrote for the occasion. She also pointed out that both of his classic sitcoms had at their core about "a man who tried to express in his own way that people need to learn to live together."

Schwartz, amazingly sharp at the age of 92, said in his speech: "I understand I'm the oldest person ever to be inducted. ...Oh, to be 91 again."

I chatted with him prior to the ceremony about the honor: "It's very exciting actually because this is like the creme de la creme. I don't know where you can go from here!"

Merv Griffin's posthumous induction was bitterwseet but his very handsome son, Tony Griffin, brought the house down with an anecdote about the time Orson Wells left a pair of his pants backstage after appearing on Griffin's talk show. His dad jumped into one leg of the oversized pants and insisted that Tony jump in the other.

"He would have absolutely loved this night," Tony told me before the show started. "It brings him alive again, for a night and for the kids, it's nice for them to see how important their grandfather really was."

We had such a great time. The video presentations for each of the honorees really showed how mucb each had accomplished and there was not a slacker in the bunch.
As we were waiting for our car at the valet, I turned around and there was Lily Tomlin! I had not seen her at any point during the night but had just finished watching "12 Miles of Bad Road" in which she stars. So my reaction when I realized I was standing next to Lily Tomlin was this: "You're HERE!"

She laughed. I laughed. Beth laughed. Then we gabbed.

Great night...As we snaked up Sunset Blvd. to the freeway, Beth and I were trying to sing the theme song to "Maude" but sorta got tripped-up after "Betsy Ross had it all sewn up...and then there's Maude!"