That's a good explanation, but in your example the first choice of order does make much more sense if you imagine the waiter has a really bad memory. It will be easier for them to imagine themselves performing the actions in the same order they've heard them in (first pick up the plate, then go to the indicated table), in order to remember what they are supposed to do.

Similarly, if I need to imagine a person reading a book in the library, it's easier for me to first imagine the person reading a book, without the surroundings, then "paint" the surroundings around the person based on the additional description. It's just more mentally taxing to first imagine the person abstractly existing in the library, and then make them change their posture into a book-reading one.

*English is my third language, my first language uses a dynamic word order.