Pop singer Miley Cyrus “can’t wait” to hug her friend Ariana Grande, whose concert was the target of the Manchester bombing.

Miley also said the terror attack has been an “eye opener” to her in terms of her own life and that of the people around her.

Ariana, 23, had just finished her concert at the Manchester Arena on Monday night when a suicide bomber detonated a bomb that killed 22 people and injured more than 50 others.

Miley said, during an appearance on The Today Show in New York: “Just to know someone that goes through that … also it makes my life seem more real.

“I don’t like a lot of people around me, I don’t really have the team and crew around me, I like to lie really low.

“Now I realise, I think that I need to know I’m around a lot of people and to protect myself and everyone that’s here.

“I take that more seriously, I’ll be more cautious … It’s really been an eye opener.”

She added: “And for my friend Ariana, it’s beyond me. I can’t wait until I get a second to give her a hug.”

Earlier in the week, Miley, 24, dedicated a performance of her new song Malibu to Grande and the victims of the terror attack on the finale of The Voice in the US.

Ariana is said to have returned home to Florida on Tuesday, and her scheduled concerts in London on Thursday and Friday were cancelled.