'I was crazy for Tom Cruise - and we had a fling,' admits Cher, 16 years his senior

The singer had a brief relationship with the actor, 16 years her junior, at the start of his career.

Only now, as she publicises an upcoming run of shows in Las Vegas, has her version of events emerged.

Reflecting on their affair, she said it could have been a "great big romance" if they hadn't been forced apart by their filming schedules.

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They may have looked like chalk and cheese but rocker Cher was 'crazy' for preppy Tom

They are thought to have met at a White House fund-raising event in the mid- eighties when he was basking in the success of his hit film Risky Business.

Cher, 39 at the time, is said to have been smitten almost immediately with the 23-year-old.

While Cruise's career was very much in its ascendancy, she had by that time been a star for almost two decades.

Cher, 61, told Oprah Winfrey: "I was crazy about him."

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Fancy seeing you here! The couple meet again in 2002

In the show, to be seen on U.S. television next month, she spoke of Cruise, now 45, as an awkward young man who was struggling to adjust to his new life.

"He was shy," she said. "He said he felt like such a boob in school and nobody talked to him. We went on a date once for dinner in a New York restaurant and the waitress was from his old school.

"He told me she never talked to him back in school, but now he was recognised he got all her attention.

"It could have been a great big romance because I was crazy for him."

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Cher, pictured with daughter Chastity, admitted she and Tom Cruise, who is 16 years her junior, once had a fling

As she recounted her time with the actor, the audience burst into a frenzy of cheering and whooping, especially when she spoke of one particularly "long night" in his arms.

The couple are thought to have dated for several months.

Their affair is understood to have ended when Cruise met Mimi Rogers, six years his senior, who was to become his first wife. He separated from Miss Rogers after three years in 1990.

He went on to marry Australian actress Nicole Kidman the same year and remained with her for 11 years until 2001.

He married third wife Katie Holmes in 2006. The couple have a two year-old daughter, Suri.

Cher has been married twice. Her marriage to Sonny Bono ended after 11 years while her second to rock star Gregg Allman lasted a mere nine days.

She told Oprah Winfrey she was currently single. She broke up with her last serious boyfriend, actor Rob Camilletti, nearly 15 years ago.

"Dating is a strange thing," she declared. "It's not every man who can be comfortable with me. Being Cher is a hard thing and difficult for him to hold his place."

Singer Cher admitted on Oprah Winfrey that she was once crazy about Tom Cruise, who is now married to wife Katie Holmes