Welcome :)
I think a widget would accomplish this on a basic level:
http://www.question2answer.org/modules.php#widget
You can use the bundled activity-count-widget as a template, then just use the following to show only on the ask form:
function allow_template($template)
{
return $template=='ask';
}
To get the widget to change according to the focused element, as in SO, just use the jQuery .focus(), I think.