My friends mute my noisy microphone. How can I take part without drowning out the calls?

I discovered I'd been muted when I asked why nobody answered my call about the left corridor. My friends said they'd been hearing my keyboard, my kettle and a conversation with my flatmate all evening.

They had asked me to mute when I wasn't speaking. I kept forgetting because I wanted to join the jokes as quickly as everybody else. I thought the background sound was occasional. Apparently it had become the loudest member of the squad.

I said they could have reminded me again, then realized that meant asking them to keep interrupting their game to manage my microphone. They want clear calls; I want to feel part of the chat. Those aren't incompatible, but my current setup is making them choose.

Would you try a button-controlled microphone, plan a quieter room, or accept some stretches of listening? I can change how I join in. I don't want to frame their muting me as exclusion when they've already told me what was getting in the way.