ok, just a little creative input...you said you wanted my character to talk to sock puppets.....how about I just talk to stacked black rocks instead....this way, I am still talking to inanimate objects, but it would open the character up to allow the inaninimate object i am talking to to be visible, and also be in every scene, like I carry them with me wherever I go.....If I am going to play a guy with mental issues who talks to things, This would be a good way to do it.....this does conflict with gurw wanting to just be in the background, but it still allows him to be everywhere and say nothing.
But again, this is your story fox, so whichever way you want me to do things, is how I will do them.