How Do You Pick Your Character Names?

Quaraun:

My main character's name is Quaraun, which is a real world Persian name from Medieval times, and means "he who walks with God" (implying the person is a prophet or priest/or at least that his parents hoped he would grow up to become a holy man of some sort)

I chose this name for my character, because he was raised in 1100's Persia, by a group of priests whom had kidnapped him from his family when he was 9 years old; the story never says what his real name was, he only ever uses this name that the priests had given him.

Also, the name is commonly used in 2edADnD for Elves. I originally found it in the 2edAD&D Elves red cover edition splat book. And liked the sound of it. Than looked it up to make sure it wasn't used in any other published novel franchise, in doing so discovered it was a Persian name, and well, it was no wonder I liked the sound of it and felt it matched my Persian Elf character.

The name shows that the priests intended him to walk in their footsteps and become a part of their priesthood. (Instead he kills the priests, escapes, and becomes a wandering vagabond wizard). The priests implanted him with a parasitic jellyfish, that they believe to be god, thus the name "he who walks with God" takes on it's full meaning, with them, literally proclaiming god lives within him now.

King Gwallmaiic aka BoomFuzzy the Unicorn:

Because he is mixed race black & Asian, he was abandoned by his real parents as a toddler, (in Medieval times, Asian culture taught that people with black skin were devils/demons; thus a dark skinned baby would often be dropped in a well to drown it). He is taken in by Scottish family, who name him Gwallmaiic, which is a real world name from Medieval Scotland. Real world Alba (Scotland) had several pygmy black Asian tribal kings in the 1200s to 1300s, who invaded Scotland and took over several tribes. Based off this real world fact, he grows up to become a warrior and crowns himself king of several clans.

Later when approaching his senior years, he tosses aside the warrior/king lifestyle and leaves Scotland. He becomes a chef and renames himself BoomFuzzy. When asked in one novel of the series, by another character, "Why BoomFuzzy?" he answers with: "Because it was the most ridiculous, none serious name I could think of. I've grown tired of the dull, dry seriousness of life. People should laugh more."

The word BoomFuzzy was spit out of a Seventh Sanctum random candy/food name generator. The word the random generator spit out was "BoomFudgy utter Creams" which I used for the candy and than I thought, give the candy chef a name to match. Thus it became "BoomFuzzy's BommFudgy Chocolate Covered ButterCreams" in the original short story, and was changed to "BoomFuzzy's BoomFudgy Apricot Stuffed Chocolate Covered Fuzzy Fuzzy Fluffy Marshmallow Bunnies" in the novel editions.

The title "The Unicorn" comes from the fact that he is a shapeshifter and spends the bulk of his time in the form of a purple unicorn.

GhoulSpawn aka The Gremlin:

Half-Elf, half-Demon. Born into a time and place where purity is sought after and half-bloods are cast into the streets, not allowed education, jobs, or to be land owners, forced into the slums, becoming beggars and thieves to survive. His mother did the unthinkable and stood up to her father and kept her half-breed baby. Unfortunately she died while he was still very young, and her father renamed the child "GhoulSpawn", which in the series, is a derogatory hate slur that is not a name at all, and is to half-Elves as the n-word is to black men in the real world. Raised as a servant/slave in his own household, he is eventually rescued from them, by main character Quaraun.

For a while he embraces the name GhoulSpawn, refusing to let people victimise him with hate slurs.

In later years, he becomes a powerful and radical wizard/alchemist/scientist who fights against injustice. Using a combination of magic and machines to fight evil, he renames himself The Gremlin, which in our real world is a word that means "the demon that throws a monkey wrench in the works", choosing that name because of it's meaning and the fact that he, being of Demon blood, deliberately destroys the works of wicked men.

And he was called Gremlin before he was called GhoulSpawn. GhoulSpawn is one of the very first characters created for the series and appeared in Volume 1: Friends Are Forever, published September 23, 1978.

At the time I had 2, yes TWO, AMC Gremlins. One was a 1974 neon orange one with yellow flames painted on it (and yes, is the one you see GhoulSpawn driving in the novels - yes, it is a car I actually owned in real life) and the other was a bronze-brown 1976. Gremlin appeared briefly in Friends Are Forever, as Sir Roderic's strange unnamed neighbour, whom Roderic dubbed "The Gremlin" because he drove a neon orange 1974 AMC Gremlin with yellow flames painted on the sides.

In later stories written throughout the 1980s, Gremlin began to appear more often as a primary character, eventually becoming a main character. 

This means, yes, he was created almost 20 years before Quaraun made his first appearance in the series, and 30 years before BoomFuzzy appeared in the series.

Gremlin would remain the nickname all characters called him, but he would never tell anyone his real name and took to introducing himself as "he Gremlin" without ever telling people why he was hiding his real identity.

It was not until the Tales From White Rock series spun off The Twighlight Manor series, and the story The Dazzling Razzbury, when we see Gremlin locked in a room in the asylum as Razzbury's roommate, that Gremlin began to talk to RazzBury about SunT'a in the T Manor's attic and Antares in thee dungeons and claimed to know their real identities, that we saw Quaraun (SunT'a) and BoomFuzzy (Antares) and GhoulSpawn (Gremlin) appear for the first time, revealing the true identities of all 3 characters, and starting the spin off series The Quaraun series, which would eventually overpower the rest becoming the primary series.