It's hard to know whether certain characters come to life or not, they either come to have their own life or they don't. I've written many things in which the characters just remain inert.
“My parents are both average size. For them to have a child who was very, very different and very, very small must have been incredibly hard.”
“Even when my parents were together, they both had to travel and work, and it wasn't like they had nine-to-five jobs. In that way, it wasn't a normal family life.”