So I have just over 10,000 BA miles that will be expiring soon, as it's been nearly 3 years since my BA F / Concorde trip to London when they had the going out of business sale

AA is my primary program, and as such the only time I would ever really need to accrue BA miles is on LHR-US routes operated by BA, which I don't typically do since AA is my primary program...
So I see I can spend $52.50 to buy the 1000 miles and keep the account goin, but my real question is -- is there really any reason to bother??? I know it's "difficult" to even establish a BAEC account -- will I lose that if the miles expire, or does the balance just reset to zero?
Thanks for any feedback.