Q: i accidentally deleted all my files. is there a way to recover them without iCloud?

welp i was trying to rename the home folder because it still had the previous user's (my uncle) name. So i changed it to where it used to say my uncle's name, i erased it and put my name in it instead. After i clicked ok, it asked for me to restart. Out of habit i hit the enter button and my computer restarted to an almost factory version, but it still has all my apps. But pictures and contacts and passwords, etc were all gone, but in the storage tab in settings, it says i still have 18 gigs worth of photos. I tried using some data recovery apps (some did bring up my old photos and files) but they asked me to pay. Should i put my uncles name back to where it is now my name or is there a program that i can use? Oh and I'm running on OS X El Capitan V.10.11.2 iMac. PLEASE HEELPPPP