Unable to undo or redo actions in iCloud photos on my iPad Files app

macarra wrote: … I’m just surprised that a stray hover/touch can do so much damage…

Again, shaking is undo.

Settings > Accessibility > Touch

It sounds like you touched a subject in the picture and it created a "sticker" which followed your finger to the upper right and stuck there.

So go to Markup

And undo

You might've gotten away with shaking the iPad right after you did it-- that's the "undo."

Did I get it right?

"I should’ve known better… is this is a feature that can be turned off? my photo got ruined, by the way… but my granddaughter loves stickers"

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Back Up your iCloud Photos Library:

What you should have known better is to back up your iCloud Photos, every-so-often. That way, you can have something to restore them from, should they be lost. Enable iCloud Photos, and then connect an external hard drive. Then, open a Finder window, and drag and drop them to the drive. Using a mobile device is not ideal for such data transfer, as they are not designed for multitasking. As long as Photos is still enabled in iCloud on this device, then all will be recoverable/downloadable. Go here: https://www.icloud.com/photos

If this had been in Photos rather than in Files, then the original picture file would never have been changed. Photos is a non-destructive editor— changes you make are just steps in a database that are added for the screen or the printer, so mistakes are recoverable. (Of course, there are ways to bypass safeties.) I wonder why you are keeping images in Files.

You absolutely need to keep backups, as The Littles said. There is some nuance to backing up an iPad.