Static web page can be loaded from your local hard drive and viewed in a web browser. However to send and receive data from a web server such as in processing a form you need a web server. This allows you to test exactly using http urls and to use a server database. As well you can make parts of your web site simplier to maintain such as sharing a menu, page header and footer across web pages.
For beginners all you need is a private web server. When you are ready to go live, then you need a public web server such as BlueHost.
Popular web servers are called the LAMP stack or Linux web hosting. LAMP stands for Linux (Operating System), Apache, MySQL and PHP. You can install the AMP part of LAMP on most computers. Here are popular free versions.
XAMPP is an easy to install Apache distribution containing MariaDB, PHP and Perl. XAMPP is really very easy to install and to use – just download, extract and start. Free of Charge.
MariaDB is a knockoff of MySQL and as of 2015 run identically per claims of the MariaDb website. For learning you should be good to go. For using your local host as a development site to upload to a production site using MySQL, you need check any database coding to be sure it works.
MAMP installs a local server environment in a matter of seconds on your Mac OS X computer, be it MacBook or iMac. MAMP is free of charge however there is a PRO version that has a fee.
WampServer is a Windows web development environment. It allows you to create web applications with Apache2, PHP and a MySQL database. Alongside, PhpMyAdmin allows you to manage easily your databases.