You're gonna be bothered by how cool I am.

I agree with most of your essay. But I think there is another motive why Jo didn't explicitly say Hermione saw herself entwined with Ron. She was trying not to be spoilery of book six. In her next answer, about Draco, she didn't want to mention Dumbledore's name as the person Draco had not the courage to kill.
It was only on the next night that she finally talked freely about spoilers when she said Dumbledore's definetely dead. But even then she tried not to be totally explicit at first (she said DD would not do a Gandalf first, even if the boy who made the question was quite explicit about it). She finally got explicit because she felt she had to make fans pass the denial stage.