Blond Ambition : Culture: The faithful gather at the Madonna Appreciation Convention to worship, imitate and market their guru.

Lisa Schuler had the deepest cleavage, but she glued her mole to the wrong side of her face.

Maybe that explains why she was an also-ran in the Madonna impersonation contest at Madonnathon ‘92, the First International Madonna Appreciation Convention. Or perhaps she simply did not meet the audience’s strict artistic standards--which is to say she didn’t grab her crotch enough.

Either way, she can take solace in having once actually met Madonna Louise Ciccone. At last weekend’s Madonnathon, a six-hour love fest and swap meet in a hotel appropriately shaped like a 16-story phallus, that was status indeed.

“It was back in Chicago,” said Schuler, pleased to be asked. Madonna was filming “A League of Her Own,” and Schuler, 32, in full wanna-be regalia, tracked her down at a female impersonators show.

“I went up to her and said, ‘Hi, girlfriend!’ She said ‘(Bleep) off.’ But she could have been worse. She could have had me dragged away.”

For such small things are Madonna fans grateful. In honor of a larger thing, Madonna’s 34th birthday, they paid $5 apiece to admire one another and the merchandise of the dozen vendors whose booths lined the walls.

Equal parts celebration, worship service and time machine, Madonnathon drew about 1,200 acolytes from at least two continents to an azure-walled, mauve-carpeted conference room about twice the size of a 7-Eleven.

In a far corner, videotapes of Madonna interviews played endlessly on a 19-inch television. Just out of earshot stood the “Madonna Collectibles Museum,” three long tables crowded with dolls, picture discs, a press kit from “Desperately Seeking Susan” and an authentic Frederick’s of Hollywood copy of the bustier Madonna wore on the Who’s That Girl Tour.

Fans perused the merchandise or huddled in small groups, trading bootleg videos for Japanese CDs and then trading addresses so they could go home and trade some more.

Buses left every few hours for a nonstop, blurry-photo, $25 tour of important sites from her suburban Detroit past, like the department store where she used to shoplift and the Dunkin’ Donuts where she hung out when she ditched church.

If some patrons were disappointed with the number of card-table merchants--”You get a lot more at a Star Trek convention,” observed Miguel Mendes of Montreal--others were positively dizzy.

“This is the greatest Madonna convention ever,” said Jim Harris, 20, forgetting that it was also the only Madonna convention ever.

“I’m the biggest fan in Paw Paw, Mich.,” he said, his voice rising in evangelical passion. “She’s the greatest entertainer ever. She’s the best dancer, the best singer, the best actress, the best everything.”

Paw Paw, don’t preach. There was no one to convert, except the occasional parents wondering what those darned kids had gotten them into this time.

“My theory is that after Sinatra, there’s no one else,” said Frank Morsovillo, 54, of Oak Lawn, Ill. He flew up Sunday morning with his daughter, Jodie, 22, who was standing respectfully behind the velvet rope that sealed off the “museum.”

“As a parent, there’s a fine line here,” Morsovillo said. “I’m very liberal in raising my child. But as a role model, this isn’t what you want.”

Well, maybe not. But any number of conventioneers counted the invited-yet-absent Madonna as an inspiration.

“She’s the richest, most powerful woman in the world,” said Jennifer Gray, a theater student from Chicago. “She’s self-made and self-motivated. She brought herself out of that little disco queen mold and turned herself into Madonna.”

Gray found out about the Madonnathon on Chicago television, but didn’t find out much. She drove to Southfield not knowing her final destination and called hotels until she found the right one.

“I’m just amazed at how she’s been able to promote herself,” said Gray, who wore her mole correctly--to the right of her nose. “I just really respect her.”

Aviva Schnarch, 15, badgered her parents into making the four-hour trip from Toronto. “It sounded like a great opportunity to add to my collection,” she said.

With $200 in hand from baby-sitting and clerical earnings, she eyed a stand-up cardboard movie display that eventually went to someone else for $50.

“She gets what she wants and she has talent,” Schnarch said. In the two years, two months, two weeks and six days since she saw Madonna perform, she has worked to become similarly assertive, “and now I’ve assumed that role. I’m not a follower. I’m a leader.”

The Carpenters sold a lot of records, too, but they probably never turned a meek junior high schooler into a drill sergeant. And they don’t figure to get their own convention.

“Madonna inspires everything I do, and I’m not ashamed to say it,” said Tim Davis, 24, a fashion design student from Cincinnati. “She made me realize who I was.”

Davis sewed most of his outfit, which included an ivory blouse-sleeved shirt with a built-in cravat, ivory Spandex knee britches and an 18th-Century-style corset with lace-up sides. The corset was crafted of the same green floral fabric as his hand-made shoes, purse and fan.

The fan had fans of its own. “I modeled it after the ‘Vogue’ video,” he said. “I snapped it open when I got here. Some girl screamed and went and got her friends.”

Vamping and posing were primary pastimes, with dozens of people dressed like Madonna or just not dressed like anything you’d normally see on the street.

Two blond teeny-boppers in top-knots and pony tails wandered around practicing synchronized Madonna moves, stopping like a parade float for anyone with a video camera. An MTV crew worked the room--the field producer actually wore a necktie --and wanna-bes compared notes on their media exposure.

“You know what? MTV talked to us!”

“So? Entertainment Weekly talked to me for a whole half-hour!”

At one point, a six-months-pregnant vendor stood on a table to take a picture of a magazine photographer taking a picture of Gray, one of the more convincing look-alikes.

Julia Nash, 24, the vendor in question, held a 2-inch-thick wad of bills in one hand and rubbed her eyes with the other.

“I’m going to cry when this is all over,” she said.

Nash was liquidating most of a collection six years in the assembling--13 cartons of magazines, videos, posters and imported CDs. “I’m having a child,” she explained, “and I have no insurance.”

Her only consolation was the thought of Madonnathon ’93. “It’ll probably be bigger. That’s when I’ll come and buy back everything I sold.”

Promoters Bruce Baron and Pete and Linda Weinzettl are already contemplating next year. The Weinzettls run a memorabilia shop in Toronto and publish the Madonna fan magazine MLC, full of articles like “Eye on Madonna” and “The U.K. Perspective.”

They genuinely like Madonna and they genuinely want to make a buck. “We have to find a way to make it even better,” Pete said.

Scott Crane, 31, a graphic artist from San Diego, had two suggestions. First, he said, “they need to get some stuff that’s really Madonna, some stuff actually owned.” And more important, “they need to get that Queerdonna thing.”

Queerdonna, a 300-pound drag queen, had been expected to enter the impersonation contest Saturday night at Menjo’s, the Detroit gay bar where Madonna learned to disco. For reasons unknown, she missed the party, which included a three-tiered birthday cake.

She also missed Sunday, leaving the field wide open for eight Girls and Boys who needed far less Material.

Gilian Opolko, an 18-year-old from Kitchener, Ontario, who won on Saturday, had the closest resemblance but only a modest bump and grind. She finished third. Ari Gold of New York City, who dressed like himself but danced like Madonna, finished second in a contest adjudicated by audience applause.

Gray, with a blond wig that might have set her back $10, won the top prize: a jacket ostensibly worn by a dancer on the Blond Ambition tour.

An hour later, she was still being approached for autographs. “It’s stardom only because I’m somebody else,” she said. “That’s the sad part.”