character loads until i had a prop in the characters hand, then straight to animate

Hi - I have a character that loads fine.  I can add animation and downloads fine.  When i take the same character and add a prop into one of his hands, it no longer treats it as a new character, but goes straight to choose an animation.  Regardless of what i add as an animation the character just stands there - the obvious issue is that the step to set the wrist, chin, etc markers are being bypassed ... anyone have a solution to this?  thanks in advance, dan