Class act Tom Hanks joins the Twitter party

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‘Testing ... testing... Is this thing on??’

That’s how Tom Hanks quietly dipped a toe into the Twitter waters Monday afternoon, on his verified account under the clever screen name @tomhanks.

And by the time you read this, he probably will have broken 100,000 followers.

What a difference fame makes, right?

[For the record at 12:27 p.m.: And what a difference a CLUE makes! That’s what the Ministry just got from commenter Liz. A previous version of this post said Hanks joined Twitter on Monday, when in fact, as Liz accurately points out, the verified @tomhanks account has existed since June 24, 2009 -- check if you want. The news is that he sent his first tweet on Monday, at which time he already had about 92,000 people following, well, not a heck of a lot./cdz]

The Ministry is looking forward to following Tom (Hey, that’s us, @LATcelebs, clicking right now! We’re No. 99,588!), not for any Tila Tequila-style theatrics or a Chris Brown meltdown, not even to hear if he’s loaded and getting into his Lamborghini, but rather because he’s been a dry wit and class act so far in real life, and we expect he’ll bring those traits to the Twittersphere.

Welcome to Twitter, Tom. As they say, ‘We have cookies.’

-- Christie D’Zurilla

Related dispatches from the Ministry of Gossip:

Hey, Tom Hanks! Keep on singing Beyonce’s ‘Single Ladies’

Star-spotting: 25 offbeat places to impress the guests

Follow the Ministry of Gossip on Twitter (like we said, we’re @LATcelebs) or become a fan on Facebook at facebook.com/ministryofgossip.