Accessing returned objects

I am trying to access objects that are returned by method calls. These
objects are not locals so my only access to them is through the method
call. For example:

getClass().<method>()

I can invoke/print the class returned by getClass(), but I cannot run
any methods on this returned object. Is there a solution for this? Am I
trying to do something in a non-standard way? I am surprised the answer
is not apparent because there have been quite a few times where I have
needed this functionality. What am I doing wrong/what am I missing?


Thanks

Michael