When there is failure, there is something to learn. Earlier, when I started my desktop, all I got was just a basic color of my desktop. Without any taskbar or desktop icon or wallpaper! So, what I did was using Ctrl +Alt + F1 to go to the console to get the things fix.

TIPS: For newbies out there, you can swap in between 6 virtual terminal from F1 to F6 using Alt + F<terminal number> when you in the terminal. Or if you on gnome, then you need to use Alt + Ctrl + F<terminal number>.

In the end, I found that it was due to some gnome related files I had removed earlier. So getting it back just by using sudo apt-get install will make it. However, I discovered 2 cool commands.

1.  To stop the running gnome desktop and start again:

sudo /etc/init.d/gdm restart

stop, restart and start can be used.

2.  To start server X:

startx