Mamma mia, here we go again.

Get used to the buzz, because now that it's finally here, "Mamma Mia!" is going to suit this town like a shiny 1970s unitard.

And we mean that in a good way.

The jukebox musical sensation based on the songs of ABBA opened Tuesday at the Blaisdell Concert Hall to a full house of dancing queens. (Yeah, we went there. Sorry.)

"Mamma Mia!" tells the story of single mom Donna Sheridan, whose young betrothed daughter is desperate to find her biological father in time for him to give her away at her upcoming wedding. The bad news: Neither mom nor daughter know the identity of dad. The good news: They have the candidates narrowed down to three men.

A comical and antic-ridden search for identity ensues — and it all happens to the tune of popular ABBA hits.

"Mamma Mia!" has been on Broadway for six years, and the touring company booked its Honolulu engagement almost a year ago.

Imagine the anticipation.

Part musical junkies, part ABBA fans, the opening-night audience had obviously prepared itself for a good time, because all it took was the dimming of the lights to unleash the excitement.

The audience opted to scream and howl its approval instead of using the more demure and theater-appropriate method of politely applauding.

Clapping wasn't going to cut it. Not at this show.

Singing along, belly laughing and loudly woohoo-ing aren't just for college bar concerts anymore.

"The best thing about doing this role is the audience," said Michelle Dawson, who plays lead actress Donna Sheridan in the Honolulu production of "Mamma Mia!" "Because the music is familiar to most people, the audience members behave more like they're at a concert than at the theater. It's great. Everyone has such a good time."

But even with Dawson's warning, we weren't exactly prepared for the level of giddy exuberance we encountered. And then it rubbed off on us.

Let the record show we may have swayed a time or two to the music, and even let a woohoo or two slip.

Our take:

SEE 'MAMMA MIA!' IF ...

• You love ABBA.

• You like a few ABBA songs.

• You have a high tolerance for corniness. This is corny stuff. It's fun, entertaining and high-energy, but corny.

DON'T SEE IT IF ...

• Singing, dancing and loud audiences annoy you.

• You are easily offended by the occasional marijuana reference or by frequent double entendres.

• You don't think there's anything funny about 1970s feminism.

BEST ONE-LINERS

• "I hope I get a chance to to get my tongue around a little Greek." — dad candidate No. 1, Harry Bright.

• "Girls today think a woman's greatest achievement is finding a man." — Tanya, Donna's friend.

• "Every morning I wake up and I thank Christ that I haven't got some middle-aged menopausal man to bother me." — Donna Sheridan.

BEST SCENES

• Donna's friends try to get her mind off of the unknown-biological-father baggage by pulling out every silly trick in the book. They finally settle on using a bottle of Jack Daniels. It works.

• The hilarious dance-off between Tanya, Donna's gold-digger cougar friend, and the much younger Pepper, who's enamored of the older woman. In the end, experience trumps youth, and Tanya wins.

CORNIEST SCENE

The betrothed couple have a moment. They sing "Lay All Your Love On Me" while crawling toward each other on the beach. The entrance of the male ensemble cast wearing snorkels and wetsuits — the torso unzipped, revealing their bare chests — actually made the scene better.

SCENE STEALERS

Keep your eye on these characters:

• Donna's never-married friend Rosie (Kittra Wynn Coomer), who is every woman, only more hilarious.

• Donna's gold-digger diva friend Tanya (Rachel Tyler), who keeps men right where she wants them, and can't understand why anyone wouldn't follow her lead.

• Pepper (Adam Michael Kaokept), one of the young men employed at Donna Sheridan's Greek island taverna who's sure he's every woman's Mr. Right.

• Aussie wanderer and dad candidate No. 2 Bill Austin, whose stay-single-forever dream is being threatened at every turn.

BEST COSTUMES

• The neon-colored snorkel-and-wetsuit ensembles that appear in the dream sequence. We don't get it, but we like it.

• Pepper's skin-tight aqua-colored booty shorts that we think were supposed to be swim trunks. Yowza!

• Rosie's white satin bell-bottomed, skin-tight one-piece jumpsuit with matching cape. Sister can rock a second-skin jumpsuit.

WORST COSTUMES

• All the elastic-waisted board shorts. Shudder!

• Sophie's wrinkled, ill-fitting wedding dress. We know it's just a costume, but we WANT to believe. A little help?

BEST AUDIENCE-PARTICIPATION MOMENTS

The audience was a show highlight, and spotting these three guys made the price of admission well worth it:

• Mayor Mufi Hannemann dancing in the hallway during intermission. Like we did, he probably had "Voulez-Vous" stuck in his head.

• Honolulu Star-Bulletin columnist Ben Wood move-move-moving to the music. He was suave about it, but he was definitely moving.

• Chef Ed Kenney of town and Downtown @ the HiSAM restaurants getting down with get down. And we're talking hands-in-the-air, side-to-side, clap-dip-clapping, ABBA-loving getting down. Is it just us, or is that a good reason to like his food even more?