Home folders on desktop?

[Ubu]

The folders from my Home folder appeared on my desktop when I logged on today. If I try to move them from my Desktop to waste basket then they are also removed from the Home folder. I can see a thread on another forum about resolving this - I think this may have something to do with Nemo but being a complete Newbie to Linux I have no idea as to how to put it right. Can anyone give me an idiot's walkthrough about how to sort this? Thanks!

[proxima_centauri]

Are you using Cinnamon? Try going to Cinnamon Settings > Desktop. Uncheck the folders you don't wish to see on the desktop.

[Ubu]

Hi. Yes I am using Cinnamon. I've tried unchecking but it made no difference. The folders on the desktop are the same ones in my Home folder. I'm wondering if I have to open root to do something, but being new to Linux not sure. Any help greatly appreciated!

[Ubu]

I've tried the solution on this link:

viewtopic.php?f=61&t=123344&p=676345&hilit=desktop+folders#p67634

Still not working. Any ideas?

[Ubu]

I changed the line XDG_DESKTOP_DIR="$HOME/" to XDG_DESKTOP_DIR="$HOME/Desktop" a number of times - as well as trying other things.It seemed to work in the end, but I have no idea why. The only different thing I did was to shut down/switch off completely and restart rather than restart, but I don't see how that made any difference. On a par with hitting the television to see if it works, but there you go...so far much prefer Mint to the Windows XP system I ran for years.