diff --git a/R/draw_legend.R b/R/draw_legend.R
index 744a320f..51108cf2 100644
--- a/R/draw_legend.R
+++ b/R/draw_legend.R
@@ -150,43 +150,47 @@ draw_legend = function(
   ## Use `!exists` rather than `is.null` for title in case user specified no title
   if (!exists("title", where = legend_args)) legend_args[["title"]] = by_dep
 
-  fill_null = function(name, value) {
-    if (is.null(legend_args[[name]])) legend_args[[name]] = value
-    return(legend_args)
-  }
-  legend_args = fill_null("pch", pch)
-  legend_args = fill_null("lty", lty)
-  legend_args = fill_null("col", col)
-  legend_args = fill_null("bty", "n")
-  legend_args = fill_null("horiz", FALSE)
-  legend_args = fill_null("xpd", NA)
+  legend_args[["pch"]] = legend_args[["pch"]] %||% pch
+  legend_args[["lty"]] = legend_args[["lty"]] %||% lty
+  legend_args[["col"]] = legend_args[["col"]] %||% col
+  legend_args[["bty"]] = legend_args[["bty"]] %||% "n"
+  legend_args[["horiz"]] = legend_args[["horiz"]] %||% FALSE
+  legend_args[["xpd"]] = legend_args[["xpd"]] %||% NA
+
   if (!isTRUE(type %in% c("p", "ribbon", "polygon", "polypath"))) {
-    legend_args = fill_null("lwd", lwd)
+    legend_args[["lwd"]] = legend_args[["lwd"]] %||% lwd
   }
+
   if (isTRUE(type %in% c("p", "pointrange", "errorbar")) && (length(col) == 1 || length(cex) == 1)) {
-    legend_args = fill_null("pt.cex", cex)
+    legend_args[["pt.cex"]] = legend_args[["pt.cex"]] %||% cex
   }
+
   if (isTRUE(type %in% c("rect", "ribbon", "polygon", "polypath", "boxplot", "hist", "histogram", "spineplot", "ridge")) || isTRUE(gradient)) {
     legend_args[["pch"]] = 22
-    legend_args = fill_null("pt.cex", 3.5)
-    legend_args = fill_null("y.intersp", 1.25)
-    legend_args = fill_null("seg.len", 1.25)
+    legend_args[["pt.cex"]] = legend_args[["pt.cex"]] %||% 3.5
+    legend_args[["y.intersp"]] = legend_args[["y.intersp"]] %||% 1.25
+    legend_args[["seg.len"]] = legend_args[["seg.len"]] %||% 1.25
   }
+
   if (isTRUE(type %in% c("ribbon", "hist", "histogram", "spineplot"))) {
-    legend_args = fill_null("pt.lwd", 0)
+    legend_args[["pt.lwd"]] = legend_args[["pt.lwd"]] %||% 0
   }
+
   if (identical(type, "n") && isFALSE(gradient)) {
-    legend_args = fill_null("pch", par("pch"))
+    legend_args[["pch"]] = legend_args[["pch"]] %||% par("pch")
   }
+
   if (identical(type, "spineplot")) {
-    legend_args = fill_null("pt.bg", legend_args[["col"]])
+    legend_args[["pt.bg"]] = legend_args[["pt.bg"]] %||% legend_args[["col"]]
   }
+
   if (identical(type, "ridge") && isFALSE(gradient)) {
-    legend_args = fill_null("pt.bg", sapply(legend_args[["col"]], function(ccol) seq_palette(ccol, n = 2)[2]))
-  } 
-  legend_args = fill_null("pt.bg", bg)
+    legend_args[["pt.bg"]] = legend_args[["pt.bg"]] %||% sapply(legend_args[["col"]], function(ccol) seq_palette(ccol, n = 2)[2])
+  }
+
+  legend_args[["pt.bg"]] = legend_args[["pt.bg"]] %||% bg
 
-  legend_args = fill_null("legend", lgnd_labs)
+  legend_args[["legend"]] = legend_args[["legend"]] %||% lgnd_labs
   if (length(lgnd_labs) != length(eval(legend_args[["legend"]]))) {
     warning(
       "\nUser-supplied legend labels do not match the number of groups.\n",
diff --git a/R/utils.R b/R/utils.R
index 59a4075d..ef093249 100644
--- a/R/utils.R
+++ b/R/utils.R
@@ -27,3 +27,8 @@ more_than_n_unique = function(x, n, small_vec_len = 1e3L) {
     return(FALSE)
   }
 }
+
+
+if (getRversion() <= "4.4.0") {
+   `%||%` = function(x, y) if (is.null(x)) y else x
+}