Name famous people you’ve met, not seen in person but actually had a conversation with.
Mine are
Mary Tyler Moore
Jerry (the Beav) Mathers
Dickie Noles (former MLB pitcher)
I feel like we’ve done this many times, but
Warren Spahn
Stephen King
Leeza Gibbons
Lee Roy Jordan
Derek Harper
Dale Ellis
Mark Aguirre
Jay Inslee
Regis Philbin
I can’t say I’ve ever had an actual “conversation” with anyone famous, but if we can count a brief “hello” and a selfie at an autograph signing / meet and greet after a show, then:
John Flansburgh and John Linnell (of the band They Might be Giants)
Mike Birbiglia (comedian)
Adam Savage (Mythbusters) – he makes an appearance at Maker Faire in San Mateo every year. Or he did until the company that put on the event went bankrupt.
Actually when I met Adam Savage I wanted to suggest a myth I thought they should revisit on the show (this was when Mythbusters was still on the air). But I chickened out and the actual words that came out of my mouth were more like “Uhhhh, hi… can you sign this? And take a picture? Uhhhhh… ok, thanks, bye.” :o
As an honorable mention, I once walked right past Lewis Black after a stand up show he hosted on the campus of UNC Chapel Hill, but I didn’t actually say anything to him.
Bart Starr (twice, once as a quarterback, once as an assistant coach. What a gentleman!)
Leonard Nimoy (graciously let me interrupt his lunch at an airport to get his autograph)
Lloyd Haines (he was dining with Leonard Nimoy so it seemed appropriate to get his autograph too)
Milton S. Eisenhower (Ike’s bro, educator, public servant, advisor to multiple presidents, humanitarian (tasked with interning the japanese americans in WWII he advocated a much less harsh approach and resigned when his recommendations were rejected). He graced the cover of Time Magazine, presided over 3 institutions of higher learning: the KSU, Penn State, and the entire Johns Hopkins U and Medical complex. Rumor has it, when Columbia U was searching for a president, one of the board members suggested they call Eisenhower and ask him, meaning Milton, but Dwight was mistakenly asked, and when he said yes, they were too embarrassed to not give him the job. 
Equally impressive accomplishment: He hosted me and my 4 college roomies at his home, and regaled us with tales of government intrigue and mystery (about the Rosenbergs, the Panama Canal, and what he really thought of Nixon) as we played backgammon and Acey Deucy. We reciprocated by throwing him first a dinner party and later an 80th birthday celebration in our student ghetto apartment, both of which seemed to delight him no end. At our graduation we stood with him in all our formal academic regalia in front of the Library bearing his name. We even ended up on his Facebook page. I have no idea why he has a Facebook page, having died in 1985. But our photo together lives on there.)
Linus Pauling (2 time Nobel Laureate)
Hamilton Smith and Dennis Nathans (Nobel Laureates)
Oh, and I once said ‘hi’ to Bob Hope in an airport, and he said ‘hi’ back.
Ray Bradbury (shook his hand).
Paul Newman (shook the hand of the man who shook Paul Newman’s hand – i.e. my brother)
Luc Robitaille (for whom one of my dogs was named).
Here’s my list. I’m only including people that, at minimum, I had some sort of real interaction with. I’m not including people I met during photo ops and meet and greet events. I’m also excluding some titans of business and industry — even though they are well known in some circles I don’t consider them household names.
Glenn Close
Chevy Chase
David Bowie
Iman
Harvey Fierstein
Ron Howard
Maria Muldar
Matthew Broderick
Estelle Getty
Matt Lauer
Jackie Collins
Marie Osmond
And I can’t shake the nagging feeling that I’m forgetting someone.
Bill Clinton
Hilary Clinton
Dave Brubeck
Don Young (R-AK); more like infamous, really.
Shirley Temple Black
Secretary of State George Shultz
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright
Missed edit window, decided to elaborate.
I worked on the original production of Torch Song Trilogy, which was a small off-Broadway venture. Harvey Fierstein, Estelle Getty and Matthew Broderick were in the cast. I don’t remember how long I worked with them, but it was over 6 months, closer to year I think. We had cast parties. We hung out at restaurants. They weren’t famous at the time.
I was a roadie with the 2nd national company of The Pirates of Penzance. Maria Muldar had the leading role.
Worked in a professional capacity at the homes of David Bowie and Iman, Glenn Close, Matt Lauer and Ron Howard.
Chatted with Chevy Chase in an elevator at the Regency Hotel in NYC.
Was working stage crew on some benefit where Marie Osmond was the headliner. She kept slipping her leash and going backstage to hang with the crew. She was awesomely down-to-earth and totally cool.
I met writer Jackie Collins at a private Christmas party, she was a friend of the hostess. I was chatting with some acquaintances and she walked up, introduced herself and joined in the conversation.
Meat Loaf
Joanne Woodward
Katharine Hepburn
Sergeant Slaughter
Julie Hagarty
Bello
Art Garfunkle
James Noble
Vincent Price
Marlo Thomas
Andy Rooney
Working retail in Connecticut gives you a lot of contact with celebrities.
We have. I may as well give my standard answer: I also have not had an actual conversion with someone famous enough that they’d be recognized by name. I’ve played a board game with Dave Arneson, co-creator of D+D, without knowing who he was at the time, but the fact that I have to mention that he was the co-creator of D+D means that he wasn’t really famous like Gary Gygax was.
Qadgop reminds me, also Nobel Laureate Ilya Prigogine.
You made me think of one that might count. Irwin Belk probably isn’t a name most people would recognize, but if you live in the southeastern US you surely know of the Belk department store chain. My first summer job as a teenager was as a groundskeeper at the Belk family’s weekend house on the shores of Lake Norman in North Carolina. They had a full time caretaker who lived on the property and he’d always hire a couple of kids to help out during the summer. So through that job I did get to meet and have conversations with Irwin Belk, I think the by then retired former CEO of the chain (I don’t really know the company’s corporate structure) and his son. Regardless of what their roll in the company was they were heirs to the Belk family fortune in any case.
I’ve met a bunch. But the two that meant the most to me (as hard core Hong Kong action movie nerd) are Benny the jet Urqueidez, whom I trained with for a few yrs, and Sammo Hung, who autographed my birth certificate (it was the only thing I had on me at the time).
People with whom I had an actual conversation, however brief:
Movie Special Effects wizard Ray Harryhausen (A charming and interesting gentleman)
Rocker Alice Cooper (He offered me a beer from his cooler, which I took. He did not take one himself.)
Carl Wilson of the Beach Boys (Brief conversation about their album at the time, “Holland.”)
Barry Williams of the Brady Bunch (Nice guy)
Eric Burdon of the Animals (A bit sullen at first but warmed up after a while. Great stories.)
Dawn Wells of Gilligan’s Island (Pushing 80 and still vivacious and charming.)
I’m sure there a few more lesser rock stars and actors I’ve forgotten about, just like they forgot about me 2 minutes after our conversation ended.)
Jim Backus (voice of Mr. Magoo) (played touch football with him when I was in 5th or 6th grade. He was QB I was center.)
William Proxmire (WI Senator of Golden Fleece awards) just a brief hello when he was running
John Glenn (while he was OH Senator after he was an astronaut)
More than half the Nobel Laureates in Economics. (Merton, Scholes, Fama, Shiller, Miller, Holmstrom I knew quite well. Samuelson, Lucas, I knew less well. Others I had nodding acquaintance.)
Isaac Asimov (went on about 5 picnics with him)
Larry Niven (talked to him for some time at an SF convention.)
Shared an airplane ride from Hartford CT to Cleveland OH with Three Dog Night (on their down hill side)
Eric Heiden
Argo Guthrie
Pete Seeger
Rodney Dangerfield
George Thorough
My husband has met
Booby Knight
Larry Bird
Chrystal Gayle
The Clintons including Chelsea. Of course everyone in Arkansas can say that. Bill kissed my bosomy teenage sister on the lips, we were calling her her pet name ‘Baby’. Bill said he kissed all the babies. When he ran for prez I tried to get my sister to call the National Enquirer. She wouldn’t do it.
Al Gore
Hank Williams Jr., 1st class SOB
A few small time Acts for a county fair board I was on.
Maya Angelou
Bobby Patrino, much disgraced footbal coach for the Razorbacks
Dick Martin, playwright Mark Medoff who I interviewed for a magazine article, and detective novel author Donald Hamilton. Who? The guy who wrote all the Matt Helm books. Best Dean Martin movies ever. I got drunk with the guy at a mutual friend of ours house in Santa Fe one afternoon in 71-72. The hostess was a recovering alcoholic who always kept large amounts of booze around for her friends. Friends like Donald who was a classic Peter O’Toole drunk. I was drinking Jim Beam. I was 22 years old.
Oh my mom interviewed and sang for Dizzy Gillespie. He said she was good but too young(she was 16) He said to come back when she had a bit more confidence. At 17 she was married. She tells me this in a cafe in Strasbourg where there was a picture of Dizzy Gillespie! She used to sing like Doris Day…I kid you not.
Since I write SF and go to the conventions, it’s a long list. Some names include (face-to-face or phone, not just online):
Terry Pratchett
Neil Gaiman
Samuel R. Delany
Raymond Feist
Harlan Ellison
Robert Sawyer
Alexi Panshin
Hal Clement
Barry B. Longyear
Joan Vinge
Nancy Kress
Jane Yolen
Peter David
Alan Steele
David Weber
Ramsey Campbell
Vincent DiFate
George R. R. Martin
David Drake
Moebus
Chelsea Quinn Yarbro
Steven Erikson
Julius Schwartz (I actually was Julius Schwartz once – he let me use his dinner reservations when he decided to eat elsewhere).
The list could go on for very long, and even longer if I listed email/online conversations.