Keyboard producing extra letters when typing and impacting system performance

I’m having some issues with my Mid-2010 MacBook Pro 15. The Apple tech guy was baffled at the symptoms I was experiencing; he was unable to help (the MacBook Pro itself has not been inspected) so I thought I would see if anyone else had a view as to what the issue could be. I’m happy to fix it myself if possible (I’m quite comfortable with doing repairs/upgrades/general maintenance on Macs and PCs at large) and would rather avoid a hefty fee from the Apple store or other repair services if it can be avoided (unless the error is due to faulty hardware where Apple will fix free of charge).
The issue lies with using the internal keybaord. Most of the keys on the keyboard work just fine, a couple don’t, however when I use the internal keyboard it significantly slows down animations (i.e. clicking on the Applications icon on the dock will take a good 5-7 seconds for it to finish the pop-up). There hasn’t been any liquid spillage or suffered from any falls so I’m not quite sure how this problem came about. These are some of the issues/symptoms I’m having which may help in a diagnosis:
-Shift key is stuck and the Mac will boot into Safe Mode on its own. Holding down the Option key upon pressing the power button until the spinning gear appears will allow the Mac to boot normally. I can use an external keyboard and the Mac runs just fine. However, if I use the internal keyboard....
-Animations run slowly and it cannot load graphics programs such as iMovie. (An error message pops up, but I do not have this latop with me at time of posting this to find what it is. If you need to know what the error message is, let me know and I will post it here when I get home). Even though I’m in ‘normal mode’ for less of a better term, using the internal keyboard will result in the Mac performing like it is in 'safe mode' until…
-Pressing any key on an external keyboard. The slow animation issue is resolved (i.e. clicking on the Application icon on dock pops up in less than a second as per normal) and the Mac will return to running as normal and everything is very responsive. iMovie will now load correctly (without the error message).
-Some letters when pressed on the internal keyboard will type another letter directly after it (e.g. If pressing ‘q’ it will type as ‘QT’ (in caps due to the Shift key being stuck), same for pressing ‘t’ will display as “TQ”. This also happens to ‘a’ as it will type ‘AB’ and ‘b’ where it will display ‘BA’. In total about 6 or 7 keys around the keyboard are affected where pressing one key will result in it being typed in caps AND a second correspoding letter. Pressing that second corresponding letter will also type in caps and it's "linked" key.
-Selecting individual files with the track pad (after pressing a key on the internal keyboard) will pick multiple items within a folder as if you were clicking and dragging to select multiple files. If I click on one file and move the cursor (without holding the click or ‘touch to drag’) to a file below, it will select everything between the two selections. Pressing a key on the external keyboard returns everything including the track pad back to normal
I’ve performed a clean install of Snow Leopard which took a little longer than usual. The install disc took some time to actually load into the installation screen, roughly 5-7 minutes longer. The external keyboard doesn’t appear to work on boot up until I get to the log in screen. I’ve cleaned inside Mac from what minimal dust was there. Finally, I’ve been unable to reset the PRAM or SMC as the laptop boots into Safe Mode due to the Shift key being stuck and the external keyboard not being recognised until I reach the log in screen to enter my password. Other keys don’t appear to be working (i.e. holding down C to boot from disc and other key commands on start-up do not work), the only key on the internal keyboard that appear to work on boot is Option which allows me to bypass the 'auto-safe mode' boot.
I’m quite sure this is hardware related and if feasible I will fix myself, if not I’m happy to use an external keyboard (except when needing to perform boot commands which is where I’ll run into some issues).System specs are as follows:
MacBook Pro 15 - Mid 2010 (April)
2.4GHz Intel Core i5
4GB RAM
160GB hard drive
NVIDIA GeForce GT330M 256MB
I’d appreciate any possible answers you have. Apologies if this has been posted elsewhere, I’m quite sure this is a unique issue so I’d be surprised to learn someone else has had this problem too after all the hours of research I’ve done!
Thanks.

lol, I was going to add "as long as it's not doing that all the time" ...but was hoping for the quick fix. You might want to check your Activity Monitor and see which program or background process is causing the activity ...have you installed anything lately that coincided with this problem? You also might want to try booting into Safe Mode to see if things still persist.

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Keyboard producing extra letters when typing and impacting system performance

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