Use cmd-up to go up a level. That button is the main thing I missed. The columns view is actually very useful. One thing I miss a lot on Windows: quick look with space.
Yeah I've been surprised no one cares about this. It is great going forward from your cwd but hard to move back and where is home?
Back is left. (In column mode, at least). Home is cmd-shift-H, or using the general purpose path navigator with cmd-G it's just tilde
Sorta late to the discussion, but hope these help you: