JSFiddle - React, Tailwind, and code Playground

HTML

<table>
	<tbody>
		<tr>
			<th width="20%" scope="row" valign="top">Description<div id="characters-left"></div></th>
			<td width="80%"><textarea id="text-area" style="width: 48%" name="poll-description" value="" maxlength="200"></textarea></td>
		</tr>
	</tbody>
</table>

JavaScript

var textarea = document.getElementById('text-area');

window.onload = textareaLengthCheck();

function textareaLengthCheck() {
    var textArea = textarea.value.length;
    var charactersLeft = 200 - textArea;
    var count = document.getElementById('characters-left');
    count.innerHTML = "Characters left: " + charactersLeft;
}

textarea.addEventListener('keyup', textareaLengthCheck, false);
textarea.addEventListener('keydown', textareaLengthCheck, false);