Can I optimise my storage on my MacBook?

I would like to control what should it delete from my computer but still store in my iCloud. I am struggling with the free space on my computer but I subscribed for a 2TB iCloud account to solve this problem. My problem is that some of my old pictures (that I only checked when I uploaded) are not deleted from my computer, but some of my weekly used documents are deleted every time because it is optimised. How can I control to delete my old and big documents from my computer - that are already uploaded to iCloud - but be available to reach them whenever I would like to it from my iCloud?

So for me it looks like it is good only for synchronising but not to be used as a real cloud service. Am I right, and if I would like to have the full control over this shall I switch to a different cloud provider?