Absolute positioning and its parent element

I've always heard that when you use absolute positioning that the element you want to act as its parent needs to have a position of relative.

I was trying to build a CSS dropdown menu and I was struggling to get the dropdown menu items stretch beyond the width of the main menu item when I had its parent element I wanted it to use set as relative; the text in the drop down menu items would just wrap.

So I looked around at other example menus to see how they did it and one I found wasn't even using any parent elements with a position of relative even though they were using absolute positioning like I was.

That example is here: http://purecssmenu.com/

So I tried removing my relative positioning and bingo - my problem went away. However now I am using absolute positioning with none of it's parents using relative positioning, they are all set to static.

So I'm wondering how that makes sense - with no relative parents wouldn't it fall back to the browser window?

If need be, here is my HTML:

    <div class="navWrapper">
        <div class="left"></div>
        <div class="nav">
            <ul>
                <li class="home"><a href="/">Home</a></li>
                <li class="spacer"></li>
                <li class="about"><a href="about_us/">About Us</a></li>
                <li class="spacer"></li>
                <li class="trademark"><a href="freetrademarksearch/">Free Trademark Search</a></li>
                <li class="spacer"></li>
                <li class="services">
                    <a href="services/">Services</a>
                    <ul class="sub">
                        <li><a href="">Trademark Search</a></li>
                        <li><a href="">Prepare &amp; File Trademark</a></li>
                        <li><a href="">Trademark Infringement</a></li>
                    </ul>
                </li>
                <li class="spacer"></li>
                <li class="testimonials"><a href="testimonials/">Testimonials</a></li>
                <li class="spacer"></li>
                <li class="more"><a href="javascript:void(0);">More Information</a></li>
                <li class="spacer"></li>
                <li class="contact"><a href="contact-us/">Contact Us</a></li>                 
            </ul>
            <div class="contentClear"></div>
        </div>
        <!-- Nav Ends -->
        <div class="right"></div>
    </div>
    <!-- Nav Wrapper Ends -->

CSS:

#header .navWrapper {
    width: 1004px;
}

#header .navWrapper .left {
    float: left;
    width: 4px;
    min-width: 4px;
    height: 47px;
    min-height: 47px;
    background: url('../images/nav-left-bg.png') left top no-repeat;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav {
    float: left;
    width: 994px;
    border-top: 1px solid #e0d0b4;
    border-left: 1px solid #e0d0b4;
    border-right: 1px solid #e0d0b4;
    border-bottom: 1px solid #e8dcc8;
    background: url('../images/nav-button-bg.png') left top repeat-x;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav ul {
    margin: 0 1px;
    display: block;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li {
    float: left;
    display: block;
    height: 45px;
    font-family: OpenSansBold, Arial;
    font-size: 16px;
    line-height: 2.9;
    text-align: center;
    color: #646464;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li.spacer {
    width: 2px;
    min-width: 2px;
    height: 45px;
    min-height: 45px;
    background: url('../images/nav-button-spacer-bg.png') left top no-repeat;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li a,
#header .navWrapper .nav li a:visited
{
    display: block;
    height: 45px;
    padding: 0 20px;
    color: #646464;
    text-decoration: none;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li a:hover,
#header .navWrapper .nav li a:active,
#header .navWrapper .nav li a:focus
{
    color: #fff;
    background: url('../images/nav-button-bg.png') left bottom repeat-x;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li.home {
    max-width: 86px;
    text-indent: -1px;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li ul.sub {
    position: absolute;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li ul.sub li {
    float: none;
    display: block;
    font-family: OpenSansSemibold, Arial;
    font-size: 14px;
    line-height: 2.3;
    height: auto;
    text-align: center;
    background-color: #f4771d;
    color: #fff;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li ul.sub li a,
#header .navWrapper .nav li ul.sub li a
{
    color: #fff;
    height: auto;
}

#header .navWrapper .nav li ul.sub li a:hover,
#header .navWrapper .nav li ul.sub li a:focus,
#header .navWrapper .nav li ul.sub li a:active
{
    background: #d66627;
}

#header .navWrapper .right {
    float: right;
    width: 4px;
    min-width: 4px;
    height: 47px;
    min-height: 47px;    
    background: url('../images/nav-right-bg.png') left top no-repeat;
}