[EdLUG] Unable to login to my kubuntu 20.04 desktop

[Alistair]

I have managed to foul up my Thinkpad running kubuntu 20.04, and cannot login to the 
desktop.
I can login to the TTY2 console, where 'HOME=/'. The /home folder contains only '.' and '..'.
I was trying to delete some folders and files from an external hdd. These had previously 
been created using the 'rsync' command on this m/c and account.
Deleting failed using the GUI so I tried to recursively remove the from the command line 
as the normal user, then using sudo.
At this point I started getting messages about system crash, kmail started complaining 
that it could not write to mailboxes. There were other messages so I shut the box down, 
during which it reported that it could not write to the drive.
It booted up to the GUI login screen, but refused login to my account.
I switched to the TTY2 console and logged in there:
It reports "no directory, logging in with HOME=/"

The 'ls -a /home' command results in "'.' and '..'" only.

It refuses to start the gui (startx) timing out with:
"xauth: timeout in locking authority file //.Xauthority
xaut: timeout in locking authority file //.Xauthority
(EE)
Fatal server error
(EE) Cannot open log file "//.local/share/xorg/xorg.1.log
(EE)
(EE)
Please consult the X.Org Foundation support at http://wiki.x.org for help
(EE)
xinit: giving up
Xinit: unable to connect to X server: connection refused
xinit: server error
xauth: timeout in locking authority file //.Xauthority"

How do I recover the system?

Regards,
Alistair
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