Crossword Genius

Self-centred, say, regarding hearing? One’s tense inside (9)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

egotistic

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'self-centred' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'say regarding hearing? one's tense inside' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'say' could be 'eg' (both can mean for example) and 'eg' is found within the answer.
'one's' could be 'is' (Roman numeral) and 'is' is located in the answer.
'tense' could be 't' (grammatical abbreviation) and 't' is present in the answer.
The remaining letters 'otic' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't see.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for egotistic that I've seen before include "self-absorbed" , "Self-centred" .)

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