Install nginx; remove /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default

[dlcmh]

sudo apt install -y nginx

Visit the IP address of your Droplet in your browser to confirm that nginx is working. Notice that https isn't yet enabled at this point.

[dlcmh]

We don't want the default page to show from here on out, so remove /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default (this file enables nginx to serve the default page you just saw):

rm -f /etc/nginx/sites-enabled/default

Changes to config files in nginx/sites-enabled needs nginx to be restarted:

service nginx restart

For reference, the file you just deleted has the following content:

##
# You should look at the following URL's in order to grasp a solid understanding
# of Nginx configuration files in order to fully unleash the power of Nginx.
# https://www.nginx.com/resources/wiki/start/
# https://www.nginx.com/resources/wiki/start/topics/tutorials/config_pitfalls/
# https://wiki.debian.org/Nginx/DirectoryStructure
#
# In most cases, administrators will remove this file from sites-enabled/ and
# leave it as reference inside of sites-available where it will continue to be
# updated by the nginx packaging team.
#
# This file will automatically load configuration files provided by other
# applications, such as Drupal or Wordpress. These applications will be made
# available underneath a path with that package name, such as /drupal8.
#
# Please see /usr/share/doc/nginx-doc/examples/ for more detailed examples.
##

# Default server configuration
#
server {
    listen 80 default_server;
    listen [::]:80 default_server;

    # SSL configuration
    #
    # listen 443 ssl default_server;
    # listen [::]:443 ssl default_server;
    #
    # Note: You should disable gzip for SSL traffic.
    # See: https://bugs.debian.org/773332
    #
    # Read up on ssl_ciphers to ensure a secure configuration.
    # See: https://bugs.debian.org/765782
    #
    # Self signed certs generated by the ssl-cert package
    # Don't use them in a production server!
    #
    # include snippets/snakeoil.conf;

    root /var/www/html;

    # Add index.php to the list if you are using PHP
    index index.html index.htm index.nginx-debian.html;

    server_name _;

    location / {
        # First attempt to serve request as file, then
        # as directory, then fall back to displaying a 404.
        try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
    }

    # pass PHP scripts to FastCGI server
    #
    #location ~ \.php$ {
    #   include snippets/fastcgi-php.conf;
    #
    #   # With php-fpm (or other unix sockets):
    #   fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php7.0-fpm.sock;
    #   # With php-cgi (or other tcp sockets):
    #   fastcgi_pass 127.0.0.1:9000;
    #}

    # deny access to .htaccess files, if Apache's document root
    # concurs with nginx's one
    #
    #location ~ /\.ht {
    #   deny all;
    #}
}

# Virtual Host configuration for example.com
#
# You can move that to a different file under sites-available/ and symlink that
# to sites-enabled/ to enable it.
#
#server {
#   listen 80;
#   listen [::]:80;
#
#   server_name example.com;
#
#   root /var/www/example.com;
#   index index.html;
#
#   location / {
#       try_files $uri $uri/ =404;
#   }
#}