Houston took to the stage in front of an estimated 5,000 fans who chanted “Whitney, Whitney” for several minutes before she emerged.

The singer thanked the crowd and responded to shouts of “I love you Whitney” with “I love you more.”

Houston then spent a few minutes exchanging banter with GMA’s Diane Sawyer and Robin Roberts and told Sawyer, who interviewed her in 2002 about her rumored drug use and said yesterday she was worried for the singer then, “Don’t be worried anymore. If you know God don’t be worried.”

Before she started singing, Houston apologized to the crowd and said that she had strained her voice taping a show with Oprah Winfrey.

“I’m so sorry. I did ‘Oprah.’ I’ve been talking for so long … I talked so much, my voice…,” she explained.

The singer kicked off her four-song set with the Alicia Keys-penned track “Million Dollar Bill” and then segued into her hit “My Love Is Your Love” during which she was joined by her daughter Bobbi Kristina.

That was followed by the title track from her comeback album, I Look To You, which she dedicated to her mother Cissy Houston, who was in the audience.

The mini-concert closed with one of Houston’s biggest barn burners, her version of Chaka Khan’s 1978 smash “I’m Every Woman.”

While the performance left much to be desired, it was nothing along the lines of Britney Spears’ apocalyptic appearance at the 2007 MTV Video Music Awards.

Granted, Whitney spent a lot of her first song dancing instead of singing, she talked her way through some lyrics and flubbed others and her voice cracked on high notes.

But given the abuse Houston has reportedly put her body through over the past decade it really shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that it’s going to take some time for her to get back to where she was almost 20 years ago.

For the most part, fans seemed to be in her corner with one telling New York Daily News, “It brought tears to my eyes. She’s been through so much in her life. She’s been working very hard, and it’s a lot to do. And she’s been doing it well.”

The Daily News itself wasn’t so kind, proclaiming, “It was one moment in time that she just wasn’t ready for.”

Judge for yourself. Does Whitney Houston still have what it takes? Is the criticism justified? Here’s the singer performing “Million Dollar Bill” on GMA.