I have been with my family so sorry for the late reply. But I asked the lounge question because I had used the lounge on this trip where I did not fly because of what happened. So I assumed it is recorded. If another scenario like this should occur, whereby I also end up using the lounge but not flying, would American penalize me? That’s why I included that question.

If you genuinely had to cancel at last minute , then no issue -- what is the likelihood of needing to cancel again after checkin? if there is a genuine excuse , then I wouldn't worry

beyond that , it sounds remarkably like asking how often can you break the CoCs without being caught

I’m sorry this loss happened to your family.

No worries. Though there’s language (quoted above) referencing buying tickets merely for accessing airport facilities, I sincerely doubt you would be in any jeopardy for your lounge use in this instance.

AA also has a “churn” detection algorithm that I have run afoul of w refundable tix before when my TA booked incorrectly and then cancelled and rebooked certain segments several times. We ultimately had to call AA and get TA to fall on sword and explain their error to allow me to be rebooked on date/time/flight that i needed. If you want to change outbound and leave return, it can be better to instruct TA to make a change as opposed to refunding and rebooking to avoid this churn issue.