Uncomfortable truth about Cher's Grammys meltdown: CAROLINE BULLOCK says what no one else will dare to admit

She's famed for an ability to Turn Back Time but, at nearly 80, the years caught up with Cher at the Grammy awards on Sunday night.

While her face looked as smooth as the proverbial baby's butt, her zoned-out confusion seemed pure senior moment as she flunked her presenting duties in a gaffe-prone display unwittingly funnier than host Trevor Noah's 'jokes'.

Sheathed in her usual leather and lace in her first Grammys appearance in 18 years, the Believe singer had rolled up to the ceremony in Los Angeles to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award.

Yet basking in the glow and adoration of being Cher, she forgot she was also supposed to announce Record of the Year – a collaboration between Kendrick Lamar and SZA called 'Luther'.

So, she sauntered off stage. 'Thank you. I guess I'm supposed to walk off now. Alright,' she said, forcing Noah to summon her back.

Cue more awkward pauses and blank bewilderment at the prompter before announcing the winner as… long deceased Luther Vandross.

'Luther... Luther Grandross [sic] – no, Kendrick Lamar!' she rambled to baffled laughter.

If ever someone needed a pair of readers….

But then again, along with slacks and senior fares, they're not really an option for the eternal rock chick.

And herein lies the root of the problem: that dichotomy between the youthful, time-frozen image doggedly projected by ageing female stars and the realities that undermine the efforts.

'She probably knew Luther,' reasoned SZA in Cher's defence during an interview with Entertainment Tonight on Monday.

Perhaps, she knew George Washington too?

'A legend was speaking. That's what I understood. Cher was queening,' said SZA.

It's a classy, response to a debacle that reduced the Snooze hitmaker to a sideshow. Particularly as, according to the night's executive producer Ben Winston, Cher had been properly prepared for the assignment.

'I promise you, we had briefed her, and I promise you, what she had to do was in the prompter,' Winston told Rolling Stone Monday.

Ok, SZA was probably right to choose respect and diplomacy towards an icon, who with five decades of hits and a best actress Oscar win deserves it.

But 'queening'?

I can't completely agree.

In truth, and in common with many other female stars of a certain vintage, ego and vanity, Cher is now a reduced version – not because of her age but the choices that have made her both shadow and parody of her former self.

It played out in her last big screen appearance – a soulless blank-faced cameo in Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again. As ageing male co-stars Pierce Brosnan and Andy Garcia embraced their jowls and paunches (and seemed to be having a lot more fun), Cher may as well have been an avatar – the skewed vanity of an ageing diva or stark reminder of the double standards of female ageing in Hollywood?

And she is by no means alone. Madonna's own excessive surgery has seen her morphing into a boiled egg head with features even more inflated than her gigantic ego. Increasingly steered around the globe by a revolving door of 20-something toyboy dancers or licking or straddling some hot new star a quarter of her age it all gives new meaning to being down with the kids….

Yes, the mold-breaking Queen of Pop has been a depressing slide from trend setter to pretender that should have been handled so much better

And what about model Heidi Klum pedalling the same try hard, tight face and toy boy triumvirate at the Grammys?

In fact, the 52-year-old mom of four was perhaps only second to Cher in the attention-hogging stakes having squeezed herself into a custom leather 'nude' dress that even Bianca Censori would think twice over.

Made to a 3D mould of her body by designer Marina Hoermanseder, the effect was more like a cheap skinned sausage while the German-born model's rictus grin was almost as tight.

I blame Donald Trump and his infamous ungallant 2015 remark to the New York Times that the then 42-year-old Klum was 'no longer a ten'. That remark should have been treated with the contempt it deserved, but did it trigger this seemingly never-ending midlife thirst for 'still got it' validation?

The evidence is damning.  From the creepy boob-to-boob Intimissimi underwear campaigns with daughter Leni, to those gratuitous bikini 'workouts'. Not to mention making sure she's papped on the beach topless in butt-chewing bikini briefs, pawing away at her not-so-hot toyboy – antics she likes to film for Instagram.

Klum has passed off her inhibitions as body confidence rooted in going to nudist beaches, but let's get real – it reeks of self-obsession, and the insecurity that she is no longer enough without ever more gimmicks and flesh-flashing.

Yes, undoubtedly women are held to greater scrutiny when it comes to ageing but there's a balance to strike between weathered banshee and well-preserved. And all too often perspective is lost - Cher's face now has less lines than when she duetted with Sonny Bono in the 1960s.

It's sad state of affairs that even the most successful and influential women continue to distort their looks, diminish their abilities or cheapen themselves in the pursuit of youth.

Ageing should involve a little evolution, not a regression fixed firmly under the male gaze.