When Michelle Williams Met Michelle Williams

Michelle Williams the 🎤singer, former member of 🎶Destiny's Child👩🏽👩🏾👩🏿 — met the other Michelle Williams — 🎥actress and ex partner of the late 🎥actor 🤡Heath Ledger. 

It's very cool the two name twins linked up🆙— but was it bound to happen if they both have a "once superstar⭐" first name (#4📈 in the 70s and currently #465📉 in US Top 1000📊) and the third most popular family last name in the US?  

Now if they both had the same middle name as well, that would truly be kismet.💫 But Michelle the actress' is: 📛Ingrid. Michelle the singer's middle name is... Michelle!  📛Tenitra is her first name! 🤯

Names.org says on the very rare name Tenitra: "Tenitra is a modern African American given name most widely recognized through the singer Tenitra Michelle Williams (of Destiny’s Child), which helps date the name’s emergence to late-20th-century U.S. Black naming traditions. Its structure and phonetics suggest creative coinage rather than direct derivation from a single Old World source; scholars often read such names as blendings or elaborations on familiar elements. Tenitra plausibly fuses the numeronymic “Ten-” (a stylistic prefix also seen in names like Tenisha) with the feminine suffix “-itra” (common in names such as Demetra/Demetra or Lakitra), aligning it with the broader African American onomastic pattern of innovative morphology, melodic cadence, and individualized identity. The meaning is thus primarily expressive and cultural-signaling uniqueness and community style-rather than a fixed lexical meaning traceable to one language."

I like singer William's first name Tenitra (which I never knew was her name until I researched her for this piece. 🤦🏾‍♀️ And I was a Destiny's Child fan growing up! 😖) over the too common Michelle. I also like actress William's middle name Ingrid more so than Michelle. Michelle is a nice name (I like the meaning: who is like God?, French var. of Michael) but it's a neutral name too — there's nothing special about it 🤷🏾‍♀️ — but it's so familiar (I once had two bffs at the same time named Michelle. 🙋🏾‍♀️ In 🏫school they were known as 'the Michelles' and teachers would refer to them by their last names. Even in our friend group, myself and our other friends would refer to them by the initial of their last name often to differentiate the two.) you almost automatically like it. Nevertheless, I can't imagine either Williams going by anything but 📛Michelle.

☔📛IRN RATING OF 📛Michelle: 👎/👍 OR 💗💗💗💗💗/10

☔📛IRN RATING OF 📛Tenitra: 👍 OR 💗💗💗💗💗💗/10

☔📛IRN RATING OF 📛Ingrid: 👍 OR 💗💗💗💗💗💗💗/10

Alysa Liu the Techie — NOT Alysa Liu the Skater

A 💻tech worker from San Francisco is named not only 📛Alysa but 📛Alysa Liu — and shares the exact same name as 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan figure skater 📛Alysa Liu. 

As 7 On Your Side ABC News 📰 reports, "the other Alysa" is finding out: "it's not always a good thing: Liu has apparently been deemed an imposter on Instagram."

Alysa says, she's heard over the years of the young skating phenom from the East Bay who shares her name. And is admired by her fellow Gen Z members, including Alysa. "When she did win the gold medal... they'd say 'Oh, congrats on the gold.' I'd say, 'I can't take credit for that but I'm really happy for her,'" Liu tells 7 On Your Side. "I feel like more inspired to be like her and... be more positive, in the way that she is, sort of because we share this, this part of our identity, like our names," she says.

But now that Alysa Liu (the skater) has won gold, the other Alysa is getting online attention meant for the superstar. "I would get... message requests from people who are trying to contact Alysa. And not only that, but I think somehow they found my number online too. So I just text them like, 'Hey, this isn't the Alysa you're looking for,'" she explains. Fans of Alysa (the skater) have offered congratulations, asking to meet, leaving adoring voice messages like this one she played for 7 On Your Side: "We love you Alysa Liu... bye Alysa Liu, I love you."

More than fans however caught the attention of seeing the name of an Alysa Liu — Meta did too. "I logged into my account and just for some reason, it said that I had been suspended from Instagram and that I had 180 days to appeal this decision, or else I would be banned permanently," Liu shares. It ironically happened the day after the Alysa (the skater) reportedly posted a story on her own Instagram, warning of scammers creating fake accounts in her name. "I was not contacting anyone or trying to, like, pretend that I was her. My account is private. I have very clearly in my bio that I'm from New Jersey. I went to Berkeley," the other Alysa explains.

Liu says she's had that Instagram account for 15 years. "So definitely, I think her popularity and fame has, like, just exploded, very suddenly. I love her, but yeah, I think it definitely was... the impetus for, like, me getting banned from Instagram. It's like, kind of like a home base for all these really cherished memories that I have. Snapshots of my life at different points in time... And so when I thought about possibly losing it, I was really sad. The parts of sharing the name that are a little bit negative are the parts that I would not like. Like, I would like to have my Instagram account back!"

Liu filed an appeal but Meta denied it, saying her driver's license wasn't enough proof of her identity. She then contacted 7 On Your Side. 7 On Your Side told Meta that the other Alysa Liu is no imposter. A spokesperson agreed to try to restore her account. But so far, it's still in limbo.

▶Click here to watch the video via YouTube📺: Another Alysa Liu loses Instagram for sharing Olympic skater's name 

🤔Just how popular is the name Alysa? 📛Nameberry🍒 says, "📛Alysa  rose in the US popularity charts starting in the 1960s and continuing in some cases until the first decade of this century. The Alysa form drifted along at the bottom of the Top 1000 girls' names from about 1990 until 2005, when Olympic skating champion Alysa Liu was born." Liu was born in 📍California and that is the state where most Alysas have the name.

🤔Is Alysa pronounced A-lisa or A-lissa? 📛NB🍒 explains, "Liu herself @:8🔊pronounces her first name ah-LISS-ah, rhyming with Melissa, but this spelling might also suggest the pronunciation ah-LEES-ah, rhyming with Lisa. With Greek roots connected to the name 📛Alice (meaning 'noble' or 'truth'), Alysa's sisters and cousins include 📛Alyssa, 📛Alicia, 📛Alisa, and 📛Alissa." Click here to see all 20+ 🤯 variants of Alysa.

I like the name 📛Alysa 👌🏾 — it's safe and can be adorable — but the spelling with a 'y' instead of the 'lissa' if it's pronounced A-lissa, throws me off and I see: A-lisa or literally A-lye-sa. 😖

☔📛IRN RATING OF 📛Alysa: 👍 OR 💓💓💓💓💓💓/10 

📌STATS ON THE NAME 📛Alysa:

https://www.mynamestats.com/First-Names/A/AL/ALYSA/index.html

📌Check out my ⏪past ☔📛 post: 📄Mads World: Having The Same Name As A Celebrity 

Mads World: Having The Same Name As A Celebrity

📰A news story is surfacing on Mads Mikkelsen being denied entry into the United States because a meme of Vice President JD Vance was found on his phone by immigration authorities.  

"About two weeks ago, a Norwegian tourist, named Mads Mikkelsen who is not to be confused with the Danish actor from the James Bond & Marvel movies..." the news anchor on MSNBC begins her report on the debacle.

Being a Bond fan 🙋🏾‍♀️, two Mads Mikkelsens is pretty cool. 😎 The name 📛Mads is a Danish variation of the name 'Matthew' (meaning 'gift of God'). Nameberry says, "Mads is a perennial favorite in Germany, the Nordic countries, and the Netherlands, where it is usually to be found in the Top 50." It was #33 in Germany in 2017 and #47 in 2019 as a most popular boy name in Denmark.  

It actual isn't a novelty for a non-celebrity to have the same name, first and last as a celebrity. VICE has the fascinating article: People with the Same Names as Celebrities Tell Us How Much It Sucks and interviews name doppelgangers of a 📛Taylor Swift, 📛Kate Middleton and 📛Sinead O'Connor.    

I can see why those who bear a celebrity's exact name, could find it maddening. 😤 Everyone wants to be an original and how can you if someone else already has your name in full? But it seems like it could be fun too at times. 🤷🏾‍♀️ Imagine signing into a hotel as Taylor Swift and getting double takes 👀 from staff seeing it's not the Taylor Swift before them. 😅    

📌👀Reddit 🤔AskReddit Community Thread: "People with the same names of celebrities, how has it affected your life?" 

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/9kqba3/people_with_the_same_name_as_celebrities_how_has/

📌📛Nameberry🍒🗣Forum: "Same name as a famous person?" 

https://forum.nameberry.com/t/same-name-as-a-famous-person/193706/17