locking the head/torso from mouse pointer movements

I've been trying to make an a/o for a quadrupedal mech. I can make the animation fine but when i stick it in an a/o or whatever, the head and torso still move with the camera/mouse pointer position - thus throwing the whole thing out. Is there any way i can disable this or design the animation so it keeps these body parts locked out?

[edit]
Ok I just read some other posts but I'm still not clear on the exact method of taking full control of the avatar.

Someone suggested moving every joint by 1 in frame 2, then starting the animation proper, from frame 3. This seems to contradict other things I've read on this issue.
Also, assuming that the above method does actually work, would I make frame 2 a keyframe or not?

Please help meeee.

So yes, you need keys on frame two that are in a different position from frame one. Without that, SL believes you don't want that joint animated at all.

Since frame one isn't shown in SL, frame two acts like it's the first frame and is the beginning of your animation.

To stop head motion completely, you need keys for both neck and head.

There's a posture collar around somewhere that stops head movement, the scripts can be pulled from it too.