e remember him from TV as the singing drummer of “The Monkees.” We’ve seen him on Broadway in the hit musical “Aida.” We heard his voice every weekday morning from 6 to 10 a.m. on WCBS-FM. Hey, we’re fans. But if you’re a cop … Micky Dolenz is your biggest fan.

That’s why every morning, behind the 101.1-FM microphone for “The Micky Dolenz in the Morning” show, he would dedicate a song to one of New York’s Finest in his “Top Cop” segment: Sam and Dave’s “Soul Man” for Police Officer Cory Gable of Transit District 12; the Animals’ “We Gotta Get Out of This Place” for P.O. Scott Jacobs of the 75 Pct.; the Beatles’ “Get Back” for P.O. Mike Scala of P.S.A. 3. And putting political correctness aside, he dedicated a request from P.O. Mike Venckus of the Transit Homeless Outreach Unit to Mayor Bloomberg. The song was “Hit the Road, Jack.”

Dolenz did these dedications in blue for many of the 100 broadcasts he aired on the station — until he and long-time deejay icon Bruce Morrow (“Cousin Brucie”) and others were informed in early June by station owner Infinity Broadcasting that the company was dumping the “oldies” format for a new concept called “Jack” (presumably appealing to younger listeners) and their shows had been abruptly cancelled.

“I’m not surprised at Infinity's decision given the state of the industry at this time,” Dolenz says philosophically, although he regrets, among other things, losing the opportunity to honor New York City police officers every day.

“I’m just a huge fan of law enforcement,” he says.

Just before the Christmas holidays, as he was formulating plans for his radio program, he graciously accepted an invitation to be a “celebrity guest” at the annual PBA Widows’ and Children’s holiday party. That’s when the idea to dedicate a song every day to a police officer came to him. A PBA staffer began collecting names and song titles for the dedications, sent the list to Dolenz and the daily “Top Cop” dedication was born.

To those who grew up in the ‘60s Micky Dolenz is a familiar face. He was the wild and wacky singing drummer of the imaginary TV band “The Monkees,” — America’s answer to British Beatlemania — and he visited our living rooms every week. His voice became part of the soundtrack of the times. Hugely successful songs like “Pleasant Valley Sunday,” “Last Train to Clarkesville” and the “The Monkees’ Theme” feature Dolenz’s unique vocal signature. His voice is burned into the memories of millions of pop music fans from that era.

Dolenz’s half-century career in entertainment began at the tender age of ten when he was cast in the title roll of the television series, “Circus Boy.” His dark hair was dyed blonde, his name changed to Micky Braddock and he was given a pet elephant as a sidekick. During a cross-country promotional junket for the show, he wound up being the elephant’s opening act — a fact that is only slight more ironic than having had guitar legend Jimi Hendrix open for “The Monkees” on their first big tour.

On the “Circus Boy” tours, “we would stop at places along the way and do photo-ops and press stuff,” Dolenz said. “I’d sing some songs with my guitar and then the elephant came out and did tricks.”

When he was auditioning for “The Monkees,” Dolenz told the producer that he was a classically trained Spanish guitarist. But the producer’s response was that they had enough guitar players, so Dolenz was cast as the drummer. Approaching this acting job like any other, he spent a year before production began learning the basics of playing the drums. Little did he know that the “imaginary” band would enjoy very real success on the record charts, success that would forever link his name to that zany TV band, “The Monkees.”

Asked if that was a blessing or curse, he chuckled. “Well, there’s no way it was a curse,” he said. “To have that kind of huge success, the money, the kudos and glory was certainly 99% a blessing. Having said that, it’s difficult to overcome the inertia created by your own success. I liken it to a train, a massive thing that requires an enormous amount of energy to get rolling. You spend all your time, energy and effort to get it going faster and faster. And then at a certain point, it becomes very successful and takes off without you. You lose control of it.”

Dolenz chose to deal with his particular runaway train by jumping off it. “I moved to England and started directing and producing television shows for the BBC,” he explained. “Didn’t sing, didn’t act, didn’t do interviews.” Initially, the newspapers would report that ex-Monkee Micky Dolenz was producing something. But in time, they dropped the ex-Monkee tag and would just report Michael Dolenz of the BBC and the project.

That 12-year period in which he separated his life from the success of the “The Monkees” allowed him to step back and consider what it was all about and to appreciate that part of his life. “Now,” he says, “when I go out and sing Monkees’ songs, it’s fun.” Dolenz recently appeared at Mohegan Sun Hotel and Casino and has scheduled other local appearances.

Dolenz doesn’t see himself as an actor who also sings or a writer who also produces and directs. He has lived his entire life in the entertainment industry on a project-to-project basis. “I’d rather be doing a very cool major-market radio show than acting in a bad musical,” he said. He said he has to have a passion for a project before he jumps into it with both feet. And that’s just how he jumped into his drive-time radio gig with New York’s biggest oldies station, which he equated to “opening on Broadway blindfolded and with no rehearsal.” Listening to the show, you would have never known it was his first full-time deejay job. And, although he’s currently auditioning for another Broadway role, we hope it’s not his last.

A final word to all the New York City police officers out there who had made his drive-time broadcast a part of their daily routine:

“Be safe.”