For all the people out there who don’t know the difference between Hannah Montana, Joe Montana and Joe Mantegna and therefore are at a disadvantage at the water cooler come a Friday morning (“Hannah Montana…isn’t she that quarterback who played in four Super Bowls?”), let me help you out.

As anyone knows who is the parent of small children (and by “small” I mean any offspring still living somewhere on your property and eating your Hamburger Helper), Hannah Montana is more famous than Celine Dion before we all started wishing she’d choke on the words to that song from “Titanic.”

But, and here’s the tricky part, Hannah Montana IS NOT A REAL GIRL.

No, Hannah Montana is a character, portrayed on a Disney Channel show, who is a 14-year-old, blonde-wig-wearing rock star who is in “real life” a girl named Miley Stewart (the quote marks indicate television “reality,” which as we all know is different from reality reality, in which I wear a blonde wig while vacuuming the house.)

So, on the show, “Miley,” a TV character, is a regular schoolgirl who wants a normal life when she is not on stage in a blonde wig being Hannah Montana.

With me so far?

Good.

Keep up.

“Miley Stewart,” the regular girl, is portrayed by Miley Cyrus, a real girl (notice the absence of quote marks), who happens to be the offspring of former country music heartthrob Billy Ray Cyrus (and by former I mean he hasn’t had a hit since 1992).

On TV, Billy Ray plays “Miley’s” dad, “Billy Ray Stewart,” who, on the show, is a country music star who has never heard of “Achy Breaky Heart” (or at least that’s what I imagine the real Billy Ray is wishing.)

So the country singer “Billy Ray” is the dad of “Hannah Montana” who is really “Miley Stewart” who in real life is Miley Cyrus who was born Destiny Hope Cyrus until she legally changed her name last month to Miley Ray Cyrus, presumably in an attempt to avoid confusing her fans.

That wasn’t so difficult, was it?

These days, “Hannah Montana,” the character, tours as a real rock star, performing for kids as young as 40 as both “Hannah” and Miley (I can’t be sure if quote marks are needed there.)

The good news is, Miley is reportedly growing up as a regular girl in real life and, from all accounts, will not go the route of the Lindsays, Britneys and Parises of the world, thereby eliminating the need for her parents to spend all her hard-earned millions on rehab. Instead they can spend her hard-earned millions on new homes and designer cowboy boots.

The bad news is, Hannah-Miley-Destiny-Hope-Miley is likely going to need years of therapy to help her separate all those personalities.