Redefining Fields to Arrays from External Data Structures

I'm having a hard time with this one and I know it has to be something I'm missing (well I am OLD!).

I have a file called ARPRF that has 20 branch codes defined. The branch code definitions look like this (snipped from entire file):

==========================================
A* BNBR - BRANCH CODES
A BNBR01 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR02 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR03 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR04 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR05 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR06 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR07 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR08 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR09 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR10 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR11 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR12 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR13 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR14 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR15 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR16 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR17 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR18 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR19 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
A BNBR20 1A TEXT('BRANCH CODE')
==========================================

In my SQLRPGLE program I am wanting to use an external data structure to contain the ARPRF file data:

==========================================
d arprf_rec e ds extname(arprf)
==========================================

And then use the following SQL statement:

==========================================
exec sql
select * into :arprf_rec
from arprf
where bncomp = :udcomp and
bnurid = :use_id;
==========================================

This works great except I need to get those branch codes into a DIM(20) array and I just don't know how to redefine/code the external DS for this. If I was defining the ARPRF file using the "F" specs then I could just have a data structure that looks something like this to handle it:

==========================================
D DS
D BNBR 1 20
D DIM(20)
D BNBR01 1 1
D BNBR02 2 2
D BNBR03 3 3
D BNBR04 4 4
D BNBR05 5 5
D BNBR06 6 6
D BNBR07 7 7
D BNBR08 8 8
D BNBR09 9 9
D BNBR10 10 10
D BNBR11 11 11
D BNBR12 12 12
D BNBR13 13 13
D BNBR14 14 14
D BNBR15 15 15
D BNBR16 16 16
D BNBR17 17 17
D BNBR18 18 18
D BNBR19 19 19
D BNBR20 20 20
==========================================

I know I can do something like this:

==========================================
BNBR(1) = BNBR01
BNBR(2) = BNBR02
.
.
.
BNBR(20) = BNBR20
==========================================

But I thought for sure I had seen something somewhere that addressed this but I just cannot find it.

Any help would be appreciated!

Eric Hill
Senior Software Developer