Hey there Troy.

Can't really say, as I don't use PLE. Just wondering, have you tried to just use the AVI as a texture? Have only used unlimited, but with it you can just use a video file instead of an image for the colour channel of a texture-map.

E.g -
- Open up the hypershade window
- Left click on Lambert
- Now open up the attribute editor
- rename it to BGVideoTexture
- click the checkered box next to the color slider
- Select the "Movie" 2D texture
- You'll notice the attrib editor's window just changed. Thats ok.
- Click the folder icon next to "Image Name" and load in your AVI file.
- Next, and hopefully last - just check the "Use Image Sequence" box to on. The text input box should turn purple to indicate that it's controlled by an expression.
In my case, it reads: "movie1.frameExtension=frame".
By adding a multiplier (or divider) to the end I can speed up or slow down the playback of the texture.

I've not worked with sequences of images, other than outputting them and then compositing. Perhaps Maya is expecting the file names to have a different format. (Think of all the formats available in the Render options)

Anyway, I heartily recommend Mike McKinnley's tutorial that covers using an avi as a texture-map. Just note that he's using an older version of Maya in the vid, and some options may be slightly different. (My description is a little different to his, but works fine with Complete 7.0)

You'll find it at https://www.mtmckinley.net/tutorials.html.
It's right down the bottom somewhere. I think it's about 2nd from the bottom.