"No wonder he's laughing — all the way to the bank — because North America has been gripped by Tickle Me Elmo hysteria," said the CBC's Jeffrey Kofman, when reporting on the Elmo toy ...

But it was not until 1996, pretty much every shopper across the country wanted to purchase the "Tickle Me Elmo" toy. RELATED: Furby, Tickle Me Elmo and Hatchimals: The must-have holiday toys of ...

During the months leading up to Christmas 1996, the hottest toy across the land was Tyco’s Tickle Me Elmo, a doll that needed hugs, which in turn made him chuckle and vibrate. Toy inventor Ron ...

2 A prototype critter called Tickles the Chimp was the first step in creating Tickle Me Elmo. The technology for Tickles the Chimp was going to be used in a toy called Tickle Me Tasmanian Devil ...