IT'S 10 o'clock on a Saturday morning in New York City. Why New York City?

Sure, why not? The specific location in question is a cavernous auditorium situated within the walls of New York City University, nestled comfortably within the shadow of the Empire State Building. Joining the writer on the morning in question is his nine-year-old daughter, unquestionably (in his wholly unprejudiced opinion) the most beautiful and talented child in the entire universe, along with roughly 300 other children, ranging in age from five to 15, 99.9% of them female. It's utterly terrifying. Each child, in turn, is accompanied by a bemused parent, not unlike myself, the grown-ups sharing the odd sympathetic shrug of the shoulders and sympathetic 'Whataya gonna do?' expression.

We're all in this together, after all. Suddenly the lights go down and the energy levels in the room - already at a somewhat tangible fever pitch - go through the roof. The children are screaming.

And squealing. And generally freaking the hell out.

A little more context might be required at this juncture; every year, the New York Times, the venerable 'Gray Lady' of the US mediaverse, stages its popular Arts And Culture Weekend, inviting its readers to a series of intimate public audiences with the cream of the liberal cultural intelligentsia. Over the next few days, audiences will gather to hear words of wisdom from heavyweights like Norman Mailer, Joan Didion, Richard Ford and Vanessa Redgrave.

Fierce craic altogether.

The hottest ticket at this year's Arts And Leisure Weekend, however, is a 14-year-old tween sensation - one who, less than 12 months ago, was a total unknown. Her name is Miley Cyrus (LEFT).

Better known as Hannah Montana. And you probably still haven't got a clue who she is.

But trust us on this one, however - she's a superstar. A superduperstar, even. And she's the reason we're all here today. The Disney Channel, let it be said, has a lot to answer for.

Day-glo sitcom Hannah Montana is the latest smash hit on Disney's premier cable channel for kids, beamed into hundreds of thousands of Irish homes daily as part of Sky Digital's Sky Kids package. It concerns the adventures of average high-school kid Miley Stewart, as played by the aforementioned Little Miss Cyrus - what the other kids at school don't actually know, you see, is that she's REALLY famous pop singer Hannah Montana? Episode after episode (after episode), our Miley gets into one wacky scrape after another as she tries to conceal her secret identity? With hillllllllllllllarious consequences. Oh, there are songs, too. Lots of songs. Along with the occasional guest appearance from Hannah's fellow Disney Channel superduperstars. Call it synergy, like.

Miley Cyrus, whose only previous role of note had been a bit part in Tim Burton's movie Big Fish, landed the Hannah role after a gruelling audition process - then they hired her real-life father, '90s one-hit wonder Billy Ray Cyrus, to play her onscreen dad. That's right - Billy 'Achy Breaky Heart' Cyrus.

These days, he's lost the mullet. They even changed the name of her TV character to her own after poor old Billy Ray kept calling her 'Miley' during rehearsals.

Cyrus is the kind of unnaturally talented performer - she's got charisma, singing chops and comedic timing to burn - that the House Of Mouse loves. Disney has always been the true home of Natural Born Entertainers, after all; during the '90s alone, TV variety showcase the Mickey Mouse Club kickstarted the career of 2007 Best Actor Oscar nominee Ryan Gosling, not to mention a trio of pipettes named Justin Timberlake, Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears. If the latter had stayed with Disney, chances are they definitely would have made her wear underwear.

Hannah Montana is but one of an extended stable of hit Disney Channel sitcoms - other current faves include That's So Raven and The Suite Life Of Zach And Cody - all of them sharp and vaguely post-modern like everything for kids tends to be in our postSimpsons era. What truly sets them apart from the pack, however, is an implicit reliance on old-school values that harks back to the days of Walt Disney himself; sure, the kids might be sassy, but they're never saucy. They might occasionally be the product of a broken home, but they still know that family is everything. Overt moral messages are kept to a minimum - this stuff is way too smart for that - but notions of honour, decency and equality are never too far from the surface.

And, in our excessively ironic, hyper-sexualised, post-post-post everything culture, there's something rather appealing about that. In the proud tradition of the best Disney product, they're harmless, entertaining and a lot of fun.

And then there are the new generation of Disney Channel stars; talents like Miley Cyrus, Raven Simone, twins Dylan And Cole Sprouse, Zac Efron, Corbin Bleu and Vanessa Anne Hudgens? If you have kids, chances are you'll get to know them all. Whether you like it or not.

In many ways, it's like the old Hollywood studio system of the '40s - groom your talent in house, churn out the crowd-pleasing product, and voila - you've got a stable of crowd-pleasers. Disney is grooming these kids for fortune and glory - and holding onto them. The current model for global megastardom, after all, requires that you excel in all showbiz disciplines - you sing, you dance, you act, you design clothes, you have your own fragrance. The Disney machine can take a starlet-in-waiting like High School Musical's Ashley Tisdale, and provide her with a TV vehicle (she's a regular on The Sweet Life Of Zack And Cody), a recording contract and a burgeoning movie career. All she has to do is avoid the potential pitfalls that can befall a young person in Hollywood - let's call it Lindsay Lohan Syndrome - and Ashley could be a serious contender.

Which brings us, in a roundabout fashion, to the whole High School Musical thing. HSM is Grease for the Disney Channel generation - a terribly old-fashioned boy-meets-girl caper that became a bona fide phenomenon. This modestly budgeted TV movie, directed by Dirty Dancing choreographer Kenny Ortega, debuted stateside last year before becoming the highest rated original movie in Disney Channel History - to date, it's been seen by around 40 million people (BBC screened it on Christmas Day) and broken DVD sales records. Considering that it cost only $4m to produce, you're looking at a whole lotta profit.

The biggest selling record in America last year wasn't by the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Jay-Z, Shakira or any of the new arrivals off the American Idol conveyor belt - it was the High School Musical soundtrack, which sold over four million copies and produced five Top 40 singles (the Hannah Montana album shifted another two million units, to boot).

The stars of High School Musical took to the road for a sold-out stadium tour - now a stage version is expected to hit Broadway this winter. Then there's the inevitable High School Musical 2, which premieres in August. They're even planning a Bollywood version. We know all this because we're privy to the nine-year-old HSM super information highway. We get all the latest updates. And we've been listening to the soundtrack every day for the past six months. That said, we did buy the bloody thing. And now we know all the words. Can't.

Stop. Listening. Too. Damn. Catchy.

None of this success happened by accident.

The credit for Disney Channel's current successes has been given to one Rich Ross, the current president of Disney Channel Worldwide and a man with an unerring knack for giving the kids precisely what they want;

since he assumed control in 2004, Ross has guided Disney Channel from strength to strength - at present, he oversees 24 Disney Channels, nine Toon Disney channels, and eight Playhouse Disney channels across the globe. Add to that an ever-expanding subscription video-on-demand service and content-rich broadband websites like DisneyChannel. com, and he's the man shaping children's entertainment for the 21st Century.

High School Musical was Ross's baby - he had a hunch that the kids were hungry for something less frenetic than the majority of what's in the market right now. And he was right. Now he's taking Disney Channel to China. Some might call it cultural colonisation - Disney has always preferred to see it as supply and demand. The unerring knack that the Disney 'family' continues to display when it comes to defining the cutting edge of family-friendly entertainment is remarkable; it's a company unafraid to take a risk on the sensibilities of a single 'visionary' - case in point the recent decision to put Pixar head honcho John Lasseter in charge of its ailing feature animation unit. In some small way, the spirit of Walt Disney lives on. Walt would have loved High School Musical, after all.

Allow me to clarify matters further. I am an old person. In marketing terms, I'm less than 12 months away from departing the key consumer demographic. It's over for me.

I'm done for. In Disney Channel terms, I am a very old person indeed. The only purpose my tired old ass can possibly serve is facilitating a child's television habits. Kids TV can be a pretty terrifying place these days, especially the satellite channels. Ever watch Cartoon Network? It's like the crack cocaine of kids' animation; if your children didn't have ADD beforehand, chances are they'll be showing some advanced symptoms after an hour of this stuff.

You can't but be cynical about Disney product - no other company gives parents the hard sell like it does. On the other hand, it has a knack, one which can't be denied, for delivering quality goods. For defining that pre-teen zeitgeist.

Which brings us back to New York University on a Saturday morning. And the preteenage riot. If you had informed me a year ago that my daughter would be flipping out over the fact that she had just been highfived by Billy Ray Cyrus, we would have informed you, pleasantly yet firmly, that you were out of your freakin' gourd.

Yet here I am. Basking in her delight.

Today, at least, we've delivered the goods.

Tomorrow we go back to being a dodgy dad again. To my right, there's suddenly a familiar parental face amidst the melee. Wait a minute? It's James Frickin' Gandolfini.

That's right, Tony Soprano himself.

Today, however, he's just another bewildered dad, accompanying the apple of his eye to see some REAL stars. The assembled crowd could care less about Tony Soprano.

They're here to see Hannah Montana. And Mr Achy Breaky Heart. He nods in my direction. I'm feeling it. Tone.

Whataya gonna do? All together, now:

Haaaaaaaaaaanah!