It's unlikely that there'll be any super-cheap bargains - otherwise everyone would just rush to book at the last minute and you'd end up with a reverse auction.

Prices a few days out tend to be the highest - these are people who know they need to travel REALLY SOON but can't take the risk that the plane won't have any seats for them. If the plane is going out with relatively few people on it, but with some fare classes sold out (or close to) then it won't be dirt cheap.

Some people will buy tickets at the last minute, some people will be late on their connecting flights and end up being rebooked on yours (but just as many may miss yours and be booked on the next one...) The big thing however is that, particularly on leisure routes, people don't tend to check in early and sort out their seat allocation. Coming back from MIA on a full flight, many people were extremely annoyed at being scattered throughout the cabin, yet there was plenty of choice of seat selection 24 hours before take-off.

As for those front row seats - generally the only way to get those is to be BA gold (which involves flying either a. a lot or b. to Hawaii in business, via Helsinki if you can!) or to pay for them in advance (£60 each, which isn't bad for the amount of space you get relative to the cost and space of the rest of the seat).

I did manage to get one for free as a blue Executive Club member by travelling on my own and grabbing one as it was released at T-24 (it was a bassinet seat so held until then) but I got really lucky (and was seated one over from a toddler anyway, though he was fairly well behaved).

That said, BA World Traveller isn't too bad... Don't forget that your laptop won't go online as there is no wifi or mobile signal in the plane.