Lol, you misunderstand me
You make menu invisible on layer 18. You disable the menu buttons in group "Menu Buttons" So user clicking doesn't click the invisible buttons.
When user clicks menu button it does 2 things.
Make layer 18 visible and enable group "menu buttons"
What you are talking about is a global user interface GUI which I have on my last layer and use zoom to fill screen.
I have my event log, my health, my whatever I want in it. It is always active, always visible.
If I want me player to go to options screen then, I disable gui butons, and make gui layer invisible and same other way round so to speak.
You can have them pop out with mouse over or whatever you want.
I think the one example is pop out menu.
Edit Number something lol - nice mmo, looks good. Nice equiping of axe,shield, dagger etc.