There will be sodium fumarate in the mix no matter whether the fumarate is purified or not. This salt is water soluble, and considering that both reagents must be dissolved in water for reaction to occur, it should never precipitate at any stage. The only contaminate possibly mixed with the freebase oil would be excess sodium carbonate, which should be readily visible and easy to wash off.

What would no bubbling in the very first step indicate? SWIM mixed .6g Fumarate and .8gCarbonate and then added drop after drop of water and other than forming a paste nothing else happened.

It would likely indicate no reaction, but SWIM really couldn't say.