desktop data disappeared after fiddling around with keychain

[baffled]

Dear all who might be able to help me:

Acknowledging I am not exactly a very computer savvy person, I went to look at my keychain to see whether by deleting something from there I would be able to start using a password to access my mail. I found a bunch of keys (under the heading 'keys') that seemed to suggest they had something to do with my email, and stupidly enough, then pressed delete: they all disappeared and as I next tried to open my email (through mac mail, that is), it indeed asked me to provide a password. What I had, however, not realised is that by deleting all those keys, my entire desktop went blank! At first I thought I'd lost all the data, yet soon enough realised that all my data was still in the folder "all my files". Yet the specific folders for pictures, movies, documents, etc. were also all empty. Somehow, it seems, all my stuff has been put in 'all my files', leaving all the other folders empty, and there is not a trace of anything left on my desktop. As I am not entirely sure what I have done, it might be difficult for anybody to help me. Yet if someone does have an idea of what might have happened, and how I restore what I did, that would be mighty helpful. When I deleted the keys, I at least realised to delete without deleting all folders – maybe that's what saved them in 'all my files'? I must say I'm rather baffled.

Many thanks.

[osxx]

If you have Time Machine up and running you can simply find your Desktop and what ever else you lost by going to the day before and click restore after selecting item/s.

[baffled]

Dear osxx,

I just tried opening the time machine – it said that it wasn't set up! (That's quite not true, as I luckily last backed up everything four days ago on my external hard drives.)

Clearly I have done something rather deleterious, to say the least. Given that when I was about to delete all those keys, it offered me the possibility to delete also all the files (or something of the sort), which I didn't, but in my opinion, chose the "less definitive" option of the two, is there a chance I could just restore everything as it was?

I know this is quite a ridiculous situation...

best.

[baffled]

Also, my desktop is indeed so blank now, that even as I connect any external device, it doesn't show on the desktop, but I can only find it through going to the finder where it appears under 'devices'. Is my desktop somehow disabled?

[baffled]

Ok, problem was solved (I had to go back to the keychain access, and restore the default settings...) No more fiddling around with things I'm clearly not competent with.

[judych]

If you have Time Machine up and running you can simply find your Desktop and what ever else you lost by going to the day before and click restore after selecting item/s.

***
can i come in here please?? i was wanting to know more about'' time machine" ...so it sounds like it is like 'systems restore"? by going back to a previous day?? if thats true its marvellous.

i dont understand how it works though. can you talk about it a bit please?? i did have a look but found it a bit confusing?? i know that if it were like a systems restore it would get me out of trouble sometimes. judych

[chas_m]

Rather than do way more typing than I would like to do, let me point you to a video that should explain it far better:

Apple - Time Machine Basics - YouTube