Verified answer

Bubbles is played by Mike Smith, a Nova Scotia native. He played guitar for the band Sandbox which was nominated for a Juno, an East Coast Music Award, and a Casby. In 1999 he was composing music for film and television and doing location sound recording, and ended up working on the original (black and white) Trailer Park Boys indie film. (He is briefly seen after being "shot" in the closing gun battle.) Mike had been doing his "Bubbles" character for years and when he was seen doing it, they wrote the character into the series.

I've linked some out-of-character pics below:

Conky needed to die so that Bubbles could be free. However, Conky is never truly dead...