Loose lips boost sales?

So imagine you’re out with your dad, and in a moment of utter parental geekiness, he happens to mention to a bunch of strangers that you’re, um, romantically available.

Now imagine said strangers are actually the national TV audience, and you have a sense of what happened to Ayla Brown, daughter of new Massachusetts senator-elect Scott Brown, last week.

“I definitely had a talk with my Dad,” Ayla, 21, said by phone as she ran to class at Boston College.

She also had a little talk with her Facebook page – well, she tightened her privacy controls – after she was deluged with friend requests.

“I had 1,568 friend requests and 300 inbox messages – mostly from men,” she said.

Not that any of this publicity is bad for Ayla, who is not only a college basketball star but a fledgling recording artist.

A tall brunette with a belter’s voice, she made it to the final 16 singers in the fifth season of “American Idol,” impressing the judges with her rendition of Christina Aguilera’s “Reflection.”

She’s sung the national anthem with the Boston Pops and released two albums. Because of all the attention on her dad, she’s moving up the release of her third, “Circles,” to Tuesday.

But back to Dad’s comment.

Ayla had been following along with the script when he started thanking his family and referred to his daughters, Arianna, 19, and herself.

“Just in case anybody is watching throughout the country, yes, they’re both available,” he said.

Squeals of shock ensued.

“No no, only kidding, only kidding,” he said. And then he corrected himself: Arianna, a premed student, was not available. But Ayla, he repeated, was.

More squeals of shock.

“My jaw dropped,” Ayla said. “I was like, that definitely wasn’t in the script!”

But will it provide a career boost?

“I hope so – we’ll see,” she said. “We don’t want to take advantage of it. But the timing has been so perfect.”

The birthday bunch

Actor Ernest Borgnine is 93. Cajun fiddler Doug Kershaw is 74. Singer Ray Stevens is 71. Singer Aaron Neville is 69. Singer Neil Diamond is 69. Actor Michael Ontkean is 64. Comedian Yakov Smirnoff is 59. Actress Nastassja Kinski is 51. Actor Matthew Lillard is 40. Actor Ed Helms is 35. Actress Tatyana Ali is 31. Actress Mischa Barton is 24.