The parent folder of the Desktop is the Home folder, or iCloud Drive, if you turn on the Desktop backup feature. The key combination ⌘↑ is go to "Enclosing folder", so it just opens the iCloud Drive.
You can press ⇧⌘H to go to the Home folder from Desktop/Finder. See Go menu for more.
You can also open Finder (from menu bar) > Settings... > General > New Finder windows show: select your Home folder. Then you can press ⌘N to open the Home folder in a new Finder window.
