TATTLE HAS a sinking feeling that the next few weeks of Michael Jackson mania are going to make the Anna Nicole Smith postmortem circus look like a simple card trick.

With the biggest, most controversial and most bizarre pop-culture figure of the past half century dying mysteriously shortly before the start of his final comeback tour, this story has enough angles - a large, dysfunctional family; a mysterious doctor; drug addiction; and orphaned children from different mothers (one of them unknown) - to keep all the tabloids, gossip mags and entertainment-news shows churning out plotlines for weeks.

Here's a cross-section of the latest reporting:

* Houston attorney Edward Chernoff told the Associated Press yesterday that his client, Dr. Conrad Murray, who was with Jackson when he died, found the former King of Pop in bed with a faint pulse - although he wasn't breathing.

Chernoff says that Jackson was still warm and Murray immediately began administering CPR.

Chernoff says that Murray suggested to Jackson's family that an autopsy be performed - the implication being that his client isn't hiding anything. He adds that Jackson did not get his Oxycontin or Demerol from Murray and that Murray prescribed drugs only in response to specific complaints from Michael.

* London's News of the World reported that as Jackson lay dying, his children thought that he was "just fooling around," an anonymous inside source said.

"He often played dead and would then jump up and surprise them, so they thought he was just having a bit of fun.

"But when they saw the emergency trucks arrive, that really shook them. There were paramedics running upstairs and ambulance sirens blaring. The kids were terrified and started crying and howling for their dad."

News of the World said that Jackson's 11-year-old daughter, Paris, screamed: "Where's Daddy?" as the paramedics burst into their mansion Thursday.

She and brothers Prince Michael and Prince Michael II (aka "Blanket") cried for their father as he lay unconscious. And while the paramedics put Jackson in the ambulance, the children were put into a car with Jackson's mother, Katherine, and sister, La Toya.

News of the World reported that, in a particularly morbid irony at UCLA Medical Center, the children drew Jackson "get well soon" pictures, even though he had already died. Soon after, when word of Jackson's death became official, the children were hurried back to their Encino home.

* According to the News of the World source, Dr. Murray also thought that Jackson was playing dead.

"Murray tried to talk to Michael to rouse him," said the LotW source, "but soon realized it was no joke. It suddenly dawned on him he was in deep trouble."

No sh--, Sherlock.

* So what might have happened?

"We were told that Michael had also been given a tranquilizer shot in the night and was pacing around the house frantically," said the source.

"He'd had a long day at his show rehearsals, which had ended after midnight. Weirdly, the work left him completely wired - he was so exhausted he couldn't sleep.

"He couldn't sit down or stay still for a second and asked for a shot to calm his nerves.

"Lord alone knows how many sleeping pills he'd also popped to try and nod off. Michael was just on edge, a wreck and a complete mess. He complained that his heart and chest were pounding."