Removing top level folder in file structure

I have been growing in confidence with my MacBook, but need advice. I am on El Capitain.
Within Documents I have folders. One of those folders contains many sub folders and files.
What I want to do is remove that top folder so making everything below as free standing folders & files.
Just can't work it out.
All ideas welcome.
Richard

You are thinking about it incorrectly. If you remove the top folder you remove everything in it, just like a real file folder in a file cabinet. To get the results you want try as follows.

You need to move each file to Documents. To to this open Documents. Then hold control and open one of the sub folders. You will see tabs for these two folders at the top of your screen. Select and drag the individual files to the Documents tab. Or alternatively, open both and size them and set them side by side and drag. If you have a lot of sub folders it may take some time to move/drag the contents of each. As you empty sub folders delete them.

I can't think of another way, unless all of the files in the sub folders have something in common, such as .jpgs or made on the same date or part of the document name, then you could search for them all and copy them from the search result page to Documents, then delete the originals.

I look forward to hearing some other suggestions to this issue, as it sometimes applies to me too when I do housekeeping.

Diane

I would open the folder you want to remove, then select all the files and folders you want to move, by selecting "command+A". Then drag them to the sidebar "Documents" folder. Now you can delete the folder in question.

That is great help, thank you.
I have moved all the folders out fine.
Now I am left with loads of individual files which have an icon of just an outline sheet. Are these OK to move also?

What kind of files are these? The 3 letter extension, such as .pdf, doc, nef, xls, etc. If they don't show, go to Finder Preferences Advanced and click the relevant choice. You can turn it off later if you don't like seeing them. You can also just look at the info for any selected file.

Did the icons show up correctly before you moved the files?

These were things like doc. docx. etc., so I experimented. Everything now moved safely to their own independence so I can reorganize from there. Thanks everyone for your help.
The big transfer from WINXP to MAC has taken time but I think I am just about there to use the MAC as my main system.