'Katie' debut light on news - New York Daily News

Ida Mae Astute/Disney-ABC

Katie Couric welcomes new mom Jessica Simpson for the debut of "Katie" on Monday.

KATIE COURIC defended her decision to chew the fat with Jessica Simpson rather than break news during the debut of her new talk show yesterday.

“Katie” premiered Monday on WABC/Channel 7 after more than a year of hype, and her guests were a plump, postpregnancy Simpson and rocker Sheryl Crow.

But the show’s biggest splash came at the end during a clip to promote Wednesday’s episode, in which Couric confronts “Project Runway” star Heidi Klum about her alleged affair with her bodyguard before her split from her hubby, singer Seal.

“We wanted to use (Monday’s show) as an opportunity to help people,” Couric told the Daily News of her decision have Simpson as her first guest. “We saw that Jessica hadn’t done any (interviews) and the struggle with her weight was something that I think a lot of women can relate to. Jessica was refreshing, honest and charming.

Couric opened the show with a weird sketch in which she was filmed lying in bed, tossing and turning while dreaming about her career since leaving “Today.” She “woke up,” wondering if it had all been a dream, to find Matt Lauer lying in the bed next to hers and telling her it was definitely real life.

“I always thought that if Matt and I worked together again we could do some kind of a dream sequence,” Couric said. “That hasn’t happened, so this was pretty much it.”

Couric told her audience that the new venture was “both exciting and terrifying” for her and at the end of the show joked, “They say you always remember your first time.” She promised her audience, “I think I’ll stick around.”