In Excel find the cells above a cell containing data

What do you mean identify? The two cells above every cell or one cell?

Can you post a sample of your sheet and how you want it to look? Do you want to calculate with the '2 cells above' values?

I want to put something in the cells so I can sort/filter the column to show only the rows that have data in that column and the 2 cells directly above the cells with data

So why not do as gerwinjansen has suggested?

>> so I can sort/filter the column to show only the rows that have data in that column
When you filter on the column for rows that have values you will automatically get the '2 cells above' because you say that they also contain data. Could you please explain in more detail or post a sample. I'm afraid we can't help you otherwise. Thx.

Here is a sample file. I want to add a word to the 2 cells immediately above any cell in the "Missing" column (Col. D) that has a number so that I can search sort and filter on that column and find the rows with the number in it and the 2 cells above them.
missing-sample.xls

In your sample, add this formula to D2:

=IF(SUM(D3:D4)=0,"","Show")       Replace word "Show" with required text.

Add an autofilter to the data and then Apply a "Show Blanks" filter to column D. D2 should still be visible.

Select D2 and all cells below. press Ctrl + D to fill down; those cells with values will not be overwritten because they are hidden.

You can now re-apply the filter to show Non Blanks.

Thanks
Rob H