In the absence of a status match top up the booked flight with your own money to J (if your company policy allows it) to accelerate getting the status?

As long as you are at the gate early it shouldn't be a huge issue with priority boarding, assuming you are concerned about the luggage space.

With OLCI you should be able to get a reasonable seat without status too.

All of my acquaintances who fly KLM often enough but without status seem to manage OK in both of these respects.