Try to avoid using the Status Line. It slows you down... use hotkey driven Marking Menus.

Above you can see my marking menu for selecting things which I have mapped to Alt+x

If you have never made a hotkey driven custom marking menu, go to Options/Customize UI/Marking Menus. Hit 'Create Marking Menu'. You can then middle-mouse-button drag items from the shelf into one of the quadrants. So the question... how do you get a pre-set selection mask onto the shelf as a button? On the status line between the 3 buttons for selection modes and the many buttons for selection types, there is a pop up menu. When you are in Object or Component mode, you will see 'Save to Shelf'... this creates a MEL button which you can click to return to the mask you are currently using. For some reason, 'Save to Shelf' is not an option while in Hierarchy mode. So below are the mel commands to map to your marking menu.

changeSelectMode -hierarchical; setHierSelectMode -root;

changeSelectMode -hierarchical; setHierSelectMode -leaf;

changeSelectMode -hierarchical; setHierSelectMode -template;

When you're finished making your marking menu, set the marking menu to be 'Accessible in Hotkey Editor', jump to the Hotkey editor, scroll to the bottom of the list, and assign hotkeys for both 'press' and 'release' to your marking menu.