If you use F keys on autopilot, you can hit FN CAPSLOCK to toggle to always be F1-F12 with a single press.
You can then get the media functions by pressing say FN F3 for mute.
Also note that if you lock the F1-F12 as I do, you can use FN with the arrow keys for home/end/pgup/pgdn - which is almost intuitive and can be done with close fingers.