Ok, this is kinda annoying. I've been wanting to use the NCR Ranger Patrol Armor, but the stance bug just grates on me. Now, I've downloaded a mod to fix that, but have run into a block. It says I'm supposed to just unpack it and drop it into the Falloutnewvegas/data folder and activate it with the Data Files option in the FNV launcher...but no such file exists that I can find.

When clicking on "data files" I get a little window with Honest Hearts.esm and FalloutNV.esm, but no selection for the mod, and I can't find anything on my computer with the .esm suffix, either.

So, modders, what the hell?

I assume you put the folder the mod was packed in into Data, rather than the actual contents of it.

The mod didn't unpack into a folder. WinZip just unpacked it and theres an icon like a sheet of paper with the windows logo on it, there is no folder that I can find.
...

Do I need to create a new folder somewhere?

Go into the download and find the section with folders named things like "meshes, textures, sounds, icons" anything like that. Not "data" "data files" or anything.

Next go to your FNV directory. "Fallout New Vegas" -> "Data"

It should have folders that look similar to those in the mod. Drag and drop, replace all, done.