Being a former 1K member myself, I understand how DimSum feels about it. I was a 1K member for several years, but my new employer has a company policy to use only AA and DL. I had no choice but to fly AA especially to DFW. Because I had no status with AA, I had to sit in not-preferrable seats until I earned an elite status with AA.

With regard to the online seat selection, you can select your seat online if you have AA FF# recorded in your AA PNR. If you are not AAdvantage member, they don't let you select seats online.