Anybody know what to do to get NPC to hold a tankard when they fill up, then drink, from the "TG03MeadBarrel" Right now, empty hand, but npc goes through the motion of filling tankard and drinking.

You need an AnimObject associated with it. It appears you already have an animation, so it should just a matter of adding the AnimObject form to associate it with the tankard.

Thanks for the response. Can you tell me how is that set up??

AnimObjects are under the miscellaneous category. Just create a new one, and fill in the form. There's not a lot there, as it's really just a link between the animation and the object, and all the detail is at the two ends.

The animation itself has a dummy object defined in it, which gets linked to the tankard via that form. Without it, the animation runs like you're seeing, with nothing in the actor's hand. You could use a tankard, a goblet, a bottle, or anything as long as it attaches correctly to the hand.

How exactly do you link the object (which is actually a furniture marker for a mead barrel animation) and the animation object? i discovered that this furniture piece is actually a part of a TG quest (Dampening Spirits). In that quest the NPC seems to already to have the tankard before approaching the mead barrel, then when approaching the barrel, he drinks.