It took too long for Cher to get into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame."I thought, what do I have to do?" she said.
"I've had number one records in all these decades.I had a song ["Believe"] that changed music forever.
And so, what is it that I've gotta do?"This year she finally made it.At her induction ceremony last month, she said, "It was easier getting divorced from two men than it was to get into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame!"It also took forever for Cher to write her story.
This week, "Cher: The Memoir – Part One" finally comes out.Asked what she wanted to say with the book, she replied, "In the beginning, I didn't wanna say much.
And then at some point, I just thought, Cher, do it or give the money back."The book centers on her years with Sonny, and her itinerant childhood with a mother who married at least seven times.She writes of how she had to be a grownup from the beginning: "One time we were driving in the car and she said, 'Cher, I don't know how we're gonna pay the rent.
What do you think?' And I was like, 'Okay, how is this gonna work? How are we gonna do this?'" In 1962, Cherilyn Sarkisian met Sonny Bono in a coffee shop.He was wearing a mohair suit and a mustard-colored shirt with a white collar.
"I thought it was like when Tony met Maria," she said."Everybody disappeared, and it was just the two of us." But she said it was not love at first sight.
"It was something," Cher said."I never felt it before." Sonny was 27, Cher was 16.
"It wasn't passionate; I just loved him," she said.What did she love about him? "How he was different than anyone else.
And he made me laugh.And we had a dream."That dream came true.
By the mid-1960s, Sonny & Cher had five songs in the top 50 at the same time.They had a #1 hit with "I Got You Babe." In the 1970s, on "The Sonny & Cher Comedy Hour," they'd become America's favorite couple, with their banter, their songs, and that Bob Mackie wardrobe: "And then, when they started to rea...