By NINA MYSKOW

Last updated at 21:23 29 February 2008

Elton John has announced that his days of dressing to excess are over, and perhaps now the world will be just a little more drab - it is the end of an era.

When I first met him 40 years ago, Elton had neither the money nor the confidence to indulge his outrageous impulses, sartorially or otherwise.

He was 20 years old, and yet to have a hit single, and the most extravagant thing I can remember the rather shy young Elton wearing was a pale yellow shirt emblazoned with Mickey Mouse.

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LEFT: Captain Fantastic - Elton joins the Russian army for his 60th birthday party. RIGHT: His flamboyant, feathery 50th birthday extravaganza

We met in the late Sixties, when I was working on Jackie, the iconic teenage magazine.

Sharing the same sense of humour, we had bonded immediately, and stayed in touch.

At his invitation I was part of the planeload of family and friends he flew to Los Angeles in 1975 when he played Dodger Stadium, dressed in a rhinestone-encrusted skin-tight white baseball outfit (he was thin as a pin - a rare moment in time, he'd be the first to admit).

I wasn't at the huge gig in Central Park in New York in the Eighties when he clambered into a vast Donald Duck costume for his encore.

But later, when I was visiting his home in LA (a house which once belonged to silent movie star John Gilbert, fiance of Greta Garbo) he showed me footage of the event, laughing hysterically.

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LEFT: Pantomime dame. Elton steals the show starring in Mother Goose. CENTRE: Hello Ducky - Elton going quackers on stage as Donald Duck. RIGHT: Star-spangled jacket and hair-raising wig as he sings in concert.

There had been no time to rehearse and he finally managed to stagger on stage, tripping over his webbed feet.

"But when I tried to sit down, the costume's bum was so big that it tipped me forward, so my nose was practically pitched onto the keyboard. It was a disaster!"

And as for his Minnie Mouse outfit? Says Elton: "The first time I met Sting, at The Forum in Los Angeles, I was dressed as Minnie Mouse. So embarrassing! He's never let me forget it."

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LEFT: Easily spotted at a Prada party in London. CENTRE: What an Eiffel hat for a night out. RIGHT: Frilled to be at a fancy-dress wedding

His famous 50th birthday party outfit ten years ago is an image that will define his style and his sense of fun for ever: a dazzling Louis XIVth concoction of white satin and silver sparkle, complete with a 15ft feather train.

This extravaganza was topped off with a wig so tall he had to travel to the party in a removal van, which got stuck for an hour-and-a-half in a limo jam of his guests.

Putting the boot in as the Pinball Wizard in the film Tommy

On arrival at the Hammersmith Palais, in a towering rage because of the delay and the weight of the wig, he had to be lowered to the ground, mechanically, on the tailgate.

But now, it seems, those days of excess are over.

Earlier this week, in the wake of his legendary Oscars-night party in Los Angeles, he told Larry King on his CNN TV show: "As you get older, you change the way you think, the way you dress.

"I could not wear some of my chicken outfits to the Oscars party. First, because I would not fit into them and secondly, because I am 61 next month, and I do not dress as flamboyantly as I used to."

Which is a pity. He has an excellent eye for design.

It's not just his stage outfits that Elton is toning down. He has changed the way he shops for clothes.

"Now I get all my clothes made by Yohji Yamamoto in Japan," he told me, as we sat at his dining table.

"It's like haute couture. He makes things specially for me, and he makes all my stage clothes," he sighed, matter-of-factly.

"At my age, I can't walk around in Dior."

In fact, Elton has always liked suits. Back in 1974, he told me that he was really into the whole ties-and-jackets bit: "I've just bought six suits in Paris," he said.

"The jackets fitted really well, but the trousers were a bit big. So my mum altered them."

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LEFT: Clowning around in baggy trousers. CENTRE: Letting his hair down as he turns 47. RIGHT: I'm still standing. At the Ritz with partner David Furnish

LEFT: Honky cat. A little costume drama of the furry kind in the early days. RIGHT: Going for gold. A glittering display from the Rocket Man.

Size has always been a problem for Elton, and the suit is a most forgiving garment.

He and his partner David Furnish have a new film project in the pipeline - a musical fantasy version of his life, with screenplay by Billy Elliott writer Lee Hall - and when I asked who he wants to play him, Elton answered with a rueful grin: "A succession of people with different weights!"

It doesn't take a psychologist to realise that his flamboyant costumes have been, in some part, his camouflage and his armour. His costumes have always cheered him up.

Although, ironically, when he was at his skinniest at Dodger Stadium, he was deeply unhappy.

Those were the onset of the dark and desperate cocaine days.

Elton, who overcame his bulimia and addictions to drugs and alcohol in 1990, is still battling with his weight, though he plays lots of tennis.

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LEFT: Fancy pants, boots and a blue biker jacket. RIGHT: Tartan overload for a stroll around town

A much slimmer Elton in pink and rhinestone wows Miss Piggy during his appearance on The Muppet Show

I told him that if I don't exercise, I feel stuffed and bloated.

He seized on the words with glee, and quick as a flash - for some reason in a fine Welsh accent - came back with: "Stuffed and Bloated? That should be the title of my autobiography!"

On the Parkinson Show, Parky once told him that his favourite costume was the Marie Antoinette one Elton wore in Australia.

Elton had indeed donned a powdered wig and make-up to match, complete with beauty spot.

But before he could get any further, Elton snapped back: "Marie Antoinette? That wasn't Marie Antoinette. It was bloody Chopin!"

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LEFT: Fancy pants, boots and a blue biker jacket. RIGHT: Tartan overload for a stroll around town

A much slimmer Elton in pink and rhinestone wows Miss Piggy during his appearance on The Muppet Show

They both roared with laughter, and Elton grinned ruefully: "To me, I thought I was Chopin. But everyone else in the world thinks I'm Marie Bloody Antoinette. That could be the story of my life!"

However he dresses, we will watch and be endlessly entertained - even without the sequins.