Songfacts®:

• In this song, Diana Ross gives her lover the boot the morning after a night of lovemaking. It's not because she just wants to love him and leave him, it's because she has a real emotional connection to this guy but knows they can't go on. Instead of dragging it out, she asks him to leave so the memory will stay intact.
  
  The song was written by lyricist Ron Miller and songwriter/producer Michael Masser specifically for Ross, who left The Supremes three years earlier and was establishing herself as a solo artist. Miller explained his thinking:
  
  "I had already dreamed up this title, 'Touch Me in the Morning,' but I didn't have the vaguest idea what it meant ... So I analyzed Diane as a person. I said, 'Well, this girl is out on her own now. She's an adult and a movie star. She's also a contemporary woman and ... much more liberal about expressing her sexual values. Whereas once upon a time, only a man could say something like that, now a liberated woman like Diane could. However, though she's ostensibly a sophisticated woman, she's still crying inside to be touched in the morning.' It was just a very cold, calculated and wonderful job of crafting."
• "Touch Me In The Morning" was the second #1 hit for Diana Ross as a solo artist, following "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" in 1970. In 1972, she made her film debut, playing Billie Holiday in Lady Sings the Blues, which earned her excellent reviews. This put Ross in some rare air as both a movie and singing star.
• This was Diana Ross' first hit produced by Michael Masser; he continued to produce more songs for her over the years, including "Last Time I Saw Him," "Theme From Mahogany (Do You Know Where You're Going To)," "I Thought It Took a Little Time" and "It's My Turn."
• Ross thought this song was too difficult for her to sing and recorded several takes on it. In a documentary about her, Michael Masser said that she tried very hard to "get the vocals right for this particular song" and that it was a "draining experience." The work paid off: It became her longest-charting pop record and also became her first #1 Adult Contemporary hit. >>

  Suggestion credit:
  Jerro - New Alexandria, PA
• The song's lyricist, Ron Miller, was impressed with Michael Masser's pop composition but worried a pure pop record would alienate Ross' fans, especially since her label boss at Motown Records, Berry Gordy, was demanding a hit in case her performance in Lady Sings The Blues went sour. For some added soul, Miller borrowed from one of Ross' earlier hits. "I didn't want Diana to lose her base so we ripped off a riff from Ashford and Simpson," Miller explained in J. Randy Taraborrelli's book Diana. "One part is straight out of 'Ain't No Mountain High Enough.' And then we had her talking in parts, all of which we did to keep the identity she established with 'Mountain' and to add some soul to the record."
• "Touch Me In The Morning" was used in the 1996 movie Phenomenon, starring John Travolta. It was also used on The Sopranos in the 2007 episode "Remember When."