Ellen pleased with first Idol show

Ellen DeGeneres is pleased with her
first American Idol show

After watching the broadcast of her first Idol episode, Ellen said she didn't let the contestants down.

She said: "I was honest with them (the singers) - I was concerned going into it I would be tiptoeing around too much, but I wasn't.

Ellen said the Hollywood auditions, in which 181 contestants will be narrowed down to 24 semifinalists, have to be tightly focused on the singers and don't have room for extensive banter among the judges.

"Everyone is anxious to see how Simon and I are going to be together and, you know, I am too," Ellen said. "I know how we were for Hollywood week, and I know there were good days and bad days. But I don't know how we're going to be on live TV. That's going to be an interesting thing."

She said Simon "is funny, but he's also funny in a way that disregards anyone's feelings ... That doesn't feel good to me because I think there's a better way to tell someone that that wasn't good".

In the US, ratings for Ellen's debut bettered last week's episode among total viewers (12 per cent) and the advertiser-favoured young adult audience (10 per cent), according to preliminary Nielsen Co figures.

Ellen received a post-show flood of congratulatory messages, including one from Fuller, who pronounced himself "really, really happy," she said.