Being the full time carer of her mother, and being kept busy with all the things poor people must do in order to do without, could partly explain her habit.

People who spend all day caring for their babies, autistic children or frail elderly parents, often long for someone they can chat to - it is the biggest treat when they get it, and they do display that combination of happy effusive chatter about anything at all, and extreme gratitude when they are with someone who can hear and respond normally.
It seemed to me, the more difficult their caring role, the more chatty they got, and the more desperately they would grab at an opportunity for a bit of a chat. They were always polite and pathetically grateful, but the speed of their speech and the variety of pointless trivia in it, means it requires some effort to keep up with, and most people switch off after a couple of minutes.
I figured that they were used to talking largely to themselves, and saying every little thing several times, and being the 'talking clock' for their charge (repeating at intervals, obvious statements like 'And now it is three o'clock, we had better start preparing tea, hadn't we?'), relying on repetition and tone to convey meaning.